Charles Smith

My ceramic work explores the nature of achievement, the deconstruction of masculine archetypes, and changing technosocial dynamics. It looks at the destabilizing effects of digital culture through an anthropological lens. Using a visual language rooted in 80s and 90s youth culture, my work plays with the everyday and the mundane to create narratives through poetic moments and theatrical set pieces, turning familiar objects into unexpected interruptions of form and surface. My practice is a constant reflection on object design and function, often filled with cultural and historical references. A set of vintage ceramic trading cards references conscious hip-hop or transcendentalism. A castelet-inspired piece on loss incorporates the visage of Jason Voorhees. A series of ceramic Polaroids document an archive of vintage t-shirts, reflecting on the decline of the American Dream and the loss of childhood innocence. My work remixes cultural periods, drawing from colonial New England in one moment and Marvel comics in the next. It aims to explore where we have erred in our stewardship of culture and society, especially in our communication and social-emotional development amid new and constantly changing challenges.
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Naimah Stith, Galleries Manager 
naimah@theclaystudio.org | 215-925-3453 x115


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