Vince Pitelka
I make utilitarian vessels that address the visual and narrative power of pattern, and the dialogue between surface, form, and containment. I am interested in the way pattern and surface influence our perceptions of exterior form and interior space. I explore a range of vessel forms incorporating influences from architecture and industry and/or reinterpreting traditional vessel types. Of particular interest are classic utilitarian vessels in clay, tin, and copper made before and during the Industrial Revolution. The simple expectations and parameters of utility have always informed vessel design, and I find beauty in commonplace industrial vessels such as gas cans, oil dispensers, water cans, and waste receptacles.
I cover my work with laminated colored clay patterns and/or impressed patterns and textures resembling basket-weave, checkerboard, brick, stone, wood grain, and other variations. Every container represents an aesthetic and utilitarian statement defining a relationship between outside surface and inside space. In many cases we associate this relationship with figurative concepts of body and soul, exposure and concealment. The exterior skin or surface rarely indicates the “soul” - the interior nature and/or contents. The narrative intent and functional utility is non-specific, creating an inherent sense of mystery as to the intent or purpose of containment. The forms are at once celebratory, ritualistic, and utilitarian.
Vince Pitelka has been professionally involved in ceramics for over thirty years. After a ten-year career as a studio potter making functional tableware and ovenware at Railroad Stoneware, his studio in Blue Lake, California, Vince returned to school in 1985 for his MFA in ceramics at University of Massachusetts, Amherst. At U-Mass he developed his colored clay marquetry techniques for creating highly detailed pattern and imagery with inlaid colored clays. His fascination with pattern and surface led to an extensive exploration of masonry patterns in colored clays. Industrial Revolution mill towns like Holyoke, Massachusetts provided inspiration for a series of vessels and sculpture that often reinterpret the precarious structure and complex surface patterns of industrial ruins.
