Alumni

Matthew Kaufman is a queer Jewish artist currently residing in Chicago, Illinois. Focusing on discreet parts of the body, Kaufman uses clay to create theatrical sculptures exploring conversations of humor and self-discomfort. By isolating and hyperbolizing body parts, he examines the different registers in which his body is taken up and given significance. The result is a compelling method by which Kaufman negotiates his own bodily insecurity and awareness and puts these affective states in conversation with his viewers. He received a BA in Studio Art and Psychology from Brandeis University.

Personal Statement: My work points to "artificiality." The process begins with a question. Even after having received art education for about 10 years in Korea, I always questioned the artificial process and wanted to get out of the typical process. So I started working by comparing the fish on display for sale to my life, which reminded me of what I felt and questioned all this time; living my life to meet other people's standards was not so different from packaged fish, so I had to get out of it. The representative work for showing the theme is Fish Market. Fish Market brings ordinary objects which viewers can see easily in their daily lives and which are transformed into artworks and placed in a special place called an exhibition hall. As a result it evokes artificial moments that viewers pass by indifferently in daily lives. In each artwork, artificial moments are created in the formalized processes of making fish and humans prepared to the needs of others, often suggesting a sense of helplessness. I was influenced by a philosopher named Zhuangzi. According to Zhuangzi, since not applying artificiality means leaving things as they are, artificiality should not be applied for any justification in order for all things to maintain their integrity. However, it is difficult to find anything without the touch of human artificiality in human civilization. The point of my work is to superficially create an artificial state, but paradoxically, to essentially pursue a natural state away from the artificial state.

Personal Statement: I have been comparing my making process to that of music making. Sometimes you make quiet music, improvise, or play loud rock. Currently, I am exploring functional ware while simultaneously making non-functional sculpture. This practice allows artistic freedom and the integrity to be able to change gears in order to play loudly or softly for each body of work.

Makayla Lindsay (she/her) is an interdisciplinary artist living in Chicago. Her work deals with themes of emotional aggression, disembodiment, and dislocation. Subsequently, at times her work is the opposite, it is a search for peace, of consciousness, and the act of letting go. Makayla received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of South Florida in 2021 and her Masters of Fine Arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.  

Rachel Heibel (she/her) is a ceramic artist based in Chicago with her MFA in ceramics from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Before moving to Chicago she began her practice at The University of Michigan where she investigated the intersection between sculpture and function, while incorporating aspects from her sustainability studies. She utilizes traditional processes of hand-building with clay to create objects that bring natural forms into indoor spaces. Her work is a representation of her making sense of the world around her through making. 

Personal Statement: I consider myself a multimedia artist but ceramics is one of the primary mediums that I‘ve been working with consistently from 2019 to now. The subject of my pieces is animals and flowers as representations of intense emotion and an exploration in abstraction. I’ve always been inspired by fantasy, mythology, folklore and horror in terms of how animals are portrayed and represented. I've always been interested in how animals are used to represent different types of ideals and morality important to the culture that resides near them despite animals not having those concepts in nature. I use that concept in my work with the animals becoming avatars to what emotions I want to convey in a form that is both foreign and unfamiliar. In terms of process, I do make hand-built pieces but most of my pieces have a thrown component that has hand-built elements made around it to create a full piece. I mostly glaze using low fire glazes. I use a spray booth for application and sometimes use stains, underglazes, or slips as an underpainting for the piece if I don’t want the clay body to show. I want my work to capture people’s attention with the color schemes I choose and the liberties I take with the forms. I want my work to feel alive and compel people to take a closer look at the detail of the surface treatment. I want to bring the internal to the external, to bring beauty to the grotesque and to connect with the audience in a way that cannot be conveyed with words.