Lisa Geue is an artist who works primarily in ceramics, creating ancient shape inspired vessels and organic looking sculptures with a focus on form and experimental glazing. With a background in photography and film, composition plays a role in both, the visual language and the photographic archive-like work. The Germany-born went to Academy of Visual Arts Leipzig from 2013 – 2019 to study Photography. In 2019 she traveled to Naarm and Jan Juc, Australia and lived at the ocean. Deepening her connection with nature, natural processes like mineralization, decomposition of coastal rocks through saltwater or cycles like high and low tide, have become inspiration for her practice. Geue has always appreciated and felt drawn to indigenous practices and ancient techniques. Not only in ceramics, but also in other crafts like Kijōka-bashōfu, the Japanese craft of making cloth from the banana fibre, Japanese bamboo weaving, natural dyeing with plant-derived dye or Pit- and Anagama fired pottery. Practices like that have been a significant influence in terms of resourcing mindfully and appreciating the craft she is doing.
Visit Lisa Geue’s website and Instagram page.
Featured work
Origin, 2021
No Greater Reef, 2021
Hybrid (i-iii), 2021
Clay is an honest material. Its plasticity allows a comprehensive range of applications, yet it will also show you its limits in its manner of processing. As a natural product, Clay is inherently organic in its appearance and visceral in its molding. I was drawn to its texture and plasticity from the beginning. Not to mention that ceramics and specific building techniques create identity formations all around the world and through the eras and time, the vessel has become an archetypal symbol for craftsmanship and spiritual rituals in human existence. With becoming a main focus in my work, the vessel and its archetypal status receive a primary role.
Creating your own glazes comes with challenges and a lot of experimentation. From the beginning I would create glazes using minerals, sand, shells, wood ash and carbides. In doing that I can create glazes that have a unique texture and surface and by using local materials, I am able to add a special geographical component to the piece.
I call my pieces ‚objects‘ because they have been revoked of their function yet the archetypal shape of the vessel and its symbolism remain intact. Appreciating ceramists who work with wild, raw clay, I would love to harvest my own to have full control of every step of my practice.
