Exhibition Insight... Generate 2020
JamFactory Associates 2020 (L-R) Tala Kaalim, Ayano Yoshizumi, Michael Carney, Ivana Taylor, Calum Hurley, Katherine Grocott, Noah Hartley, Bart Rentmeester, Emma Cuppleditch, Xanthe Murphy and Jordan Leeflang. Photo: Josh Geelan.
Generate 2020
Generate 2020 is the tenth and final curated exhibition of work by the last cohort of artists and designers to complete the two-year JamFactory Associate training program. Since 2010, Generate has been an annual showcase of outstanding work and new ideas by emerging craft-based practitioners.
This exhibition celebrates JamFactory’s role in nurturing emerging talent as these artists and designers transition into professional practice. They are the next generation of furniture and object designers, ceramic artists, glass practitioners and jewellers.
Generate 2020 is showing at JamFactory, Adelaide in Gallery One from 4 December 2020 – 7 February 2021.
Words by Rebecca Freezer.
FURNITURE STUDIO ASSOCIATES
Ivana Taylor
Textile + Object Designer
Born: 1994, Sydney
Qualifications: Bachelor of Design (Hons): Art Education/Design, University of New South Wales Art & Design (2018)
There is an inherent mindfulness and meditation experienced not only by Ivana Taylor during her making-process, but also by the end user of her wonderfully tactile furniture and soft-sculptures. Ivana demonstrates her textile expertise through her intelligent wrapping, weaving and knotting of upholstery around a modest form. Her fundamental construction principle is simple - design for disassembly.
A UNSW Art & Design alumna, Ivana’s career began as a freelance textile designer and a design & technology educator at Sydney’s Pittwater House School. In 2016 she travelled to Gujarat, India with renowned Australian textile artist Liz Williamson where she learned traditional wood-block printing and natural dye processes. Yet, it was the furniture she observed within the nomadic communities of Gujarat that inspired her Marci bench. This piece is also named after her costumier mother Marcia from whom Ivana inherited her craft.
While at JamFactory, Ivana’s practice has further transitioned from surface design to woven, three-dimensional objects and furniture. Honing her skills in timber joinery and employing macro-scale textile techniques, Taylor contemplates the interdependency of textiles (natural fibres like wool and linen) and timber (typically white ash or oak) in furniture-making. Her Arch Light integrates a steel frame and features her signature wrapping at its largest scale yet.
Ivana Taylor was featured in Wallpaper* Magazine’s 2020 Design Graduate Directory and in the Gallery Sally Dan-Cuthbert group show Osmosis during Melbourne Design Week 2020. Her Bound Bench was nominated for Melbourne’s DENFAIR: Front & Centre, 2019; and featured in HOME:MADE at Craft ACT, Canberra, 2019. Previously she appeared in Designing Bright Futures at the Australian Design Centre, Sydney, 2019.
Ivana Taylor is represented by Gallery Sally Dan-Cuthbert, Sydney.Ivana Taylor is represented by Gallery Sally Dan-Cuthbert, Sydney.
Ivana Taylor, Wrapped Arch (floor light), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.
Calum Hurley
Furniture + Object Designer
Born: 1993, Adelaide
Qualifications: Bachelor of Interior Architecture, University of South Australia (2015)
Calum Hurley’s background in interior architecture and furniture design has led to a practice which deeply considers the ways in which we occupy our surroundings. He creates furniture and lifestyle products for the home that enhance small, everyday moments of ritual.
His visually distinctive designs are characterised by geometric shapes in bursts of bold colour. Most arresting are his infusions of high-gloss blood-red. Calum’s ongoing exploration of materials has led to his working in Jesmonite – a composite material that combines plaster and cement with water-based resin. Calum’s melding of crushed glass, shells and coloured resin to this malleable material allows him to cast his own type of terrazzo. In 2019 Calum collaborated with Melbourne-based Portuguese designer Marta Figueiredo to create the Jesmonite tabletop for her award-winning Elementary Abacus.
For Generate 2020 Calum has created a suite of dining chairs and wall-mirrors that are complemented by a broad range of materials. Here he incorporates his beloved Jesmonite alongside powder-coated steel and upholstery crafted by his mother, Carol Herbertson, a master spinner and weaver. This body of work not only highlights Calum’s innovative design sensibilities and engagement with local fabricators but also his own refined level of craftsmanship when working with timber.
This year Calum Hurley’s first realised chair design Chair001 was a finalist for the VIVID Décor + Design Furniture Award and Melbourne’s DENFAIR: Front & Centre. Also in 2020 he exhibited alongside fellow JamFactory Furniture Associate Jordan Leeflang in their show Differing Perspectives at CRAFT ACT, Canberra and as part of Melbourne Design Week’s Ductility by alt.material at Studio Edwards’ 408 Smith St. In 2019 his works were featured in the solo exhibition Reflecting Location at praxis ARTSPACE, Adelaide and were nominated for DENFAIR: Front & Centre and WORKSHOPPED19 at Australian Design Centre, Sydney.
Calum Hurley, Dining Chair (upholstered), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.
Jordan Leeflang
Furniture + Object Designer
Born: 1993, Adelaide
Qualifications: Bachelor of Interior Architecture, University of South Australia (2016)
There is a spatial awareness and structural integrity to Jordan Leeflang’s practice that is firmly grounded in his interior architecture training. His furniture and products are designed and constructed with three tenets in mind: pleasing proportions, complementary materials, and meticulous craftsmanship.
Jordan’s Cab Chair elevates the everyday lounge chair. The gradated sides in American white oak and its wide, cushioned seat offer the perfect balance between comfort and aesthetics. Inspired by long journeys to unfamiliar places, this chair is described by Jordan as the ‘ideal layover in your travels’. Its upholstered seat in Pan Am blue offers premium comfort within a striking architectural exterior. Cab Chair is imbued with a distinct sense of place – inspired by images of metropolis skylines. The piece incorporates Jordan’s exacting hand-crafted process of coopering and lamination - using narrow lengths of timber to shape the chair’s curves.
Jordan Leeflang’s Sunday Stool was the winner of the Australian Design Centre’s WORKSHOPPED19 Award. His Soft Spot Bowls were nominated for the 2019 VIVID Object Design Award. In 2020 he exhibited alongside fellow JamFactory Furniture Associate Calum Hurley in their show Differing Perspectives at CRAFT ACT and as part of Ductility by alt.material at Studio Edwards’ 408 Smith St, Melbourne. Ripple Side Table, a collaboration with fellow JamFactory Ceramic Associate Xanthe Murphy was joint winner of DENFAIR: Front & Centre 2020.
Jordan Leeflang, Cab Chair, 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.
CERAMICS STUDIO ASSOCIATES
Xanthe Murphy
Ceramic + Object Designer
Born: 1996, Sydney
Qualifications: Bachelor of Design (Hons), University of New South Wales (2018)
Xanthe Murphy’s multidisciplinary training in ceramics, textiles and object design has given her a uniquely diverse practice, creating exquisitely crafted objects and furniture that tread the line between the decorative and the functional. Xanthe’s work centres on the question of how to be a sustainable designer in times of mass consumerism.
A UNSW alumna, Xanthe’s design education led to six-months training in product design at Politecnico di Milano, Italy. Xanthe’s ethos is to promote longevity, which relates to her special interest in the traditional Japanese craft of kintsugi. Translating to ‘golden joinery’ a lacquer mixed with powdered precious metals is applied to repair broken pottery to highlight, rather than conceal the imperfections. Xanthe’s contemporary application of this ancient practice uses resin and powdered brass pigment.
Her Tidelines lights explores the capacity of porcelain to achieve contrasting levels of transparency. The slip cast shade draws inspiration from the soft sand markings of a retreating tide by harnessing the imperfections of the slip casting process - when an inconsistent hand-pour results in uneven marks, known as ‘tidelines’. The table lamp encompasses an element of surprise. Unlit, the sleek dome seamlessly blends with its surrounds. Its unique variation of layered transparency is only revealed once illuminated. The light creates a warm ambient glow through the fine porcelain.
While at JamFactory Xanthe Murphy worked closely with Pukatja Community potters at Ernabella and in Adelaide to realise works for Tarnanthi 2019. This year her works appeared in Workshopped20 at Australian Design Centre. Her Tidelines pendant received an Honourable Mention in the Lighting category of the 2020 VIVID Décor + Design Awards. Her collaboration with fellow JamFactory Furniture Associate Jordan Leeflang Ripple Side Table was joint winner of DENFAIR: Front & Centre 2020.
Xanthe Murphy + Jordan Leeflang, Ripple Side Tables (black + white), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.
Michael Carney
Painter + Ceramic Artist
Born: 1983, Adelaide
Qualifications: Masters by Research (Visual Arts), University of South Australia, 2016; Bachelor of Visual Arts, University of South Australia, 2009.
Painter turned ceramic artist Michael Carney integrates his painting practice with his ceramic artworks through gestural mark-making and dystopian subject matter. In both media he marries methodical creation with spontaneous deconstruction as he plays with the aesthetics and philosophies of decadence and decay to create explosive porcelain sculptures.
After completing a Master of Visual Arts at the University of South Australia (2016), Michael’s ceramic practice was bolstered during a residency in the porcelain capital of Jingdezhen, China. Michael employs Jingdezhen porcelain throughout most of his work, drawn to its symbolic and material properties. He taps into its historical significance as a link between Eastern and Western traditions as he emulates the shapes and decorative motifs associated with the Baroque and Rococo period. They are styles chosen to allow the greatest contrast to his ruinous gestures. He refers to these opposing elements as ‘historical aesthetics in flux’. His wall work Time slip, 2020 is a site-specific sculpture. Michael plans to push the concept of ephemeral art further in his future exhibition practice.
His ceramics and paintings were included in the group exhibition Dreamlights 2019 at Chancery Lane Gallery, Adelaide. His work Rococo, 2017 was featured in the virtual JamFactory exhibition The Nouveau Rococo in 2020. His first solo exhibition of ceramic artworks was displayed at BMG Art, Adelaide in 2020.
Michael Carney, Janus, 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.
GLASS STUDIO ASSOCIATES
Tala Kaalim
Glass Artist
Born: 1996, Sydney
Qualifications: Bachelor of Visual Arts (Hons), University of Sydney, Sydney College of the Arts (2018)
Tala Kaalim’s practice is material and process driven. Motivated by the diverse properties of glass itself and identifying glass-blowing as a kind of abstract story-telling, her artworks display different visual and textural qualities in a variety of objects and forms. Tala’s finished works often reveal the different stages of her experimental process.
Hailing from the small coastal town of Woy Woy, NSW and an alumna of Sydney College of the Arts, Tala draws her inspiration from natural phenomena, patterns and formations. Previously her visual experiments have interrogated the alchemy of copper and glass and in Generate 2020 she explores the founding particle of glass – a grain of sand. Tala plays with ideas of perception and explores the organic nature of glass by disrupting its surface to create an irregular, granular texture. The tactility of this rough surface juxtaposed against its cool smoothness reconnects the raw material to the medium of glass and the process of its liquefaction.
In 2020 Tala Kaalim undertook an eight-week mentorship with Adelaide-based Glass Artist, Jess Loughlin. Tala was a finalist in the Wagga Wagga Art Gallery’s National Emerging Art Glass Prize in 2020 for her work Window of Granules, 2019.
Tala Kaalim, Moonlight Streams (series), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.
Noah Hartley
Glass Blower, Artist + Designer
Born: 1995, Sydney
Qualifications: Bachelor of Design Arts (Hons), Australian National University School of Art & Design, 2017
Noah Hartley identifies creatively as a studio glass artist. Recognising the importance of being both the designer and maker of an object, Noah has utilised his time at JamFactory to hone his hand skills and diversify his practice from functional glassware to experimental artwork.
His glass training began in his hometown of Canberra, where he completed a Bachelor of Design Arts (Hons) at the Australian National University School of Art & Design. He has undertaken multiple masterclasses at Canberra Glassworks, Pilchuck Glass School, Washington and Corning Museum of Glass, New York.
Throughout his practice, Noah explores a language of contrasting techniques and ideas. His Generate 2020 works are blown glass vessels that use traditional cane-work and carving techniques in unconventional patterns to interrogate the conversations between surface and colour; and pattern and form. Inspired by the art and ideas of Josef Albers and the surreal illustrations of Luigi Serafini’s Codex Seraphiniaus, Noah creates playful, occasionally functional, often contradictory art objects.
During his time at JamFactory Noah Hartley has completed intensive glass blowing workshops with Nick Mount, Yusuke Takemura, Anu Penttinen and Clare Belfrage.
Noah Harley, Drop Shadow Dot Dot Dash (and Friend), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen
Ayano Yoshizumi
Glass Artist
Born: 1991, Japan
Qualifications: Bachelor of Fine Arts, Industrial, Interior and Craft Design, Musashino Art University, Tokyo (2014); Glass Certification, Toyama Institute of Glass Art (2016)
Japanese artist Ayano Yoshizumi, has a strong interest in the use of glass as an expressive material to create multiple, sculptural still lifes. Informed by the broad scope of her undergraduate degree, Ayano strikes a unique balance between fine art, design and craft in her creation of both objets d’art and glass homewares.
In her ICON series of glass objects Ayano utilises glass blowing, kiln-forming and enamelling. She refers to space and colour; opaqueness and transparency; and the serendipitous nature of the hot-glass medium as her ‘primary tools’. These glass bricks produced in multiple sizes and colours, hold a sculptural aesthetic appeal, especially when grouped or stacked into different formations. Her colour palette is painterly, varying from bold orange to softer greens and colourless transparencies. Influenced by Fauvism in her expressive use of colour, Ayano complements the glass forms with the application of enamel paint.
Ayano’s work Icon #2003, 2020 was a finalist in the Emerging Category of the 2020 FUSE Glass Prize. Her glass planter pots Stack Planter, 2020 received an Honourable Mention in the Australian Design Centre’s Workshopped20. In 2019, Ayano completed a residency at the Pilchuck Glass School, Washington, supported by the JamFactory Medici Collective.
Ayano Yoshizumi, ICON#2010 (series), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.
Bart Rentmeester
Glass Blower + Artist
Born: 1984, Middleburg, the Netherlands
Dutch glass artist Bart Rentmeester joined his family’s glass studio in the Netherlands in 2008 where over the next decade he developed a strong foundation working in solid glass. His experience in the production and design of stained-glass windows and fused glass monuments led to the development of his own artistic projects. Further training with Australian glass artist B. Jane Cowie opened up Bart’s involvement in large glass sculpture commissions in Singapore, China and Australia.
Bart’s artistic practice relates to distance and time and interrogates the balance of nature between its extremes – day and night; summer and winter; rain and draught. While Bart continues to work mainly in solid glass, he uses glassblowing as the fundament to create three-dimensional effects and colour applications. His Natura series, which was a finalist for the 2020 Adelaide Parklands Prize, draws on his time spent in Australia. He pays homage to South Australia’s natural landscape, replicating the process of bark shedding from gumtrees. This response is a metaphor for his own creative development as he continues his experimentation and application of new techniques – from murrine to mould blowing.
His vast sky and in distance series of works are defined as ‘an exploration of the unknown’. They are a result of challenging experiments where glass is layered in a way that generates depth. The layers are then cut and polished to reveal a play of light, colours and dimensions.
During his time at JamFactory Bart Rentmeester has completed intensive glass blowing workshops with Nick Mount, Yusuke Takemura, Anu Penttinen and Clare Belfrage. In 2019, with support from JamFactory’s Medici Collective, Bart completed a masterclass with Masahiro Sasaki at the Corning Museum of Glass, New York.
Bart Rentmeester, vast sky (series), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelan.
JEWELLERY AND METAL STUDIO ASSOCIATES
Emma Cuppleditch
Jewellery + Object Designer
Born: 1992, Adelaide
Qualifications: Bachelor of Contemporary Art, UniSA (2018)
Adelaide-born Emma Cuppleditch creates hand-crafted jewellery and objects for the home using an eclectic range of everyday craft materials. Her vibrant products and playful line of jewellery are created under the moniker ELC Studio.
In Generate 2020 Emma finds new uses for forgotten things with a child-like imagination. The free-handed application of kaleidoscopic fluorescent colours gives new life to an inexpensive metal object, gleaned from a thrift shop. The This Way That Way light uses a stainless steel ice bucket flipped upside down to become a pendant lightshade. Emma painstakingly applies layer after layer of chalk paint to achieve the right opacity and vibrancy of colour. She applies repetitive, geometric designs in flamboyant colourways to an abundance of forms. Each piece has a homespun edge that studies the human connection with ready-made objects and the escapism of decorative crafting. Inspired by traditional quilting motifs with feminist undertones, Emma challenges the frequently undermined idea of patterning being merely a decorative pursuit devoid of meaning and depth of practice.
Emma Cuppleditch’s first solo exhibition Found was displayed at Onkaparinga Arts in 2019. She exhibited alongside fellow JamFactory Jewellery and Metal Associates in Connect by Worth Gallery in 2019 and the SALA Festival show All That Glitters in 2020. She regularly teaches moulding, casting and resin jewellery workshops and recently received a Creative Development Grant from the Helpmann Academy to expand her jewellery range and exhibition practice.
Emma Cuppleditch, This Way That Way (pendant light), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelan.
Katherine Grocott
Jeweller + Paper Artist
Born: 1974, Glen Innes, NSW
Qualifications: Doctor of Philosophy, Charles Sturt University (2012); Master of Higher and Professional Education, University of Technology Sydney (2006); Bachelor of Theology (Hons), Charles Sturt University (2005); Bachelor of Design (Hons), University of Technology Sydney (1995)
With a Doctorate in Philosophy (2012) and an education in theology and ministry, Dr Katherine Grocott’s self-taught jewellery practice speaks of the big issues. Her wearable art forms go beyond adornment to make bold statements on social justice and ethical praxis. She questions the accepted values, concepts and materiality of jewellery to create works with a political message and a personal narrative.
Her Chatelaine (Journey of a Making Life), 2020 is a visual metaphor that distils her larger ideas about gender equality, memory loss and sustainability amongst emblems of her artistic pathway. Katherine has created a modern version of a Chatelaine (from French: ‘lady of the castle’), which in its early 19th century form would have been a functional jewellery piece worn suspended from a belt hook. Katherine’s Chatelaine contains meaningful objects that highlight her diverse range of skills in a broad range of materials. Each locket has been 3D SLS printed encasing something referencing the people and experiences that have shaped her creatively. Two tiny silver Pianola rolls speak to the two significant partners in Katherine’s life. A silver O-ring with flush stone settings refers to her close knit and supportive family. A tiny silver book acts as a miniature portfolio of Katherine’s career while also revealing her book binding skills.
Katherine Grocott’s Indigenous Invisibility series of necklaces were included in 9 March an Exhibition Project that toured across Russia in 2020. Her It Is On Fire, Greta brooch was a finalist in the 2019 Urban Cow Art Prize, Adelaide. She has exhibited alongside fellow JamFactory Jewellery and Metal Associates in the show Connect by Worth Gallery in 2019 and the SALA Festival exhibition All That Glitters in 2020. Katherine regularly teaches metal and mixed medium jewellery making workshops for all skill levels.
Katherine Grocott, Chatelaine (Journey of a Making Life), 2020. Photo: Josh Geelen.