Dirk Staschke
Inverted Portrait with dog and Setting Sun
2023

About the Item

Dirk Staschke is a full time studio artist who is best known for his exploration of Dutch Vanitas still life themes in the medium of ceramics. His current body of work explores the space in between sculpture and painting and often uses meticulous representation as foil for examining skill and craft. He received his BFA from the University of Montevallo followed by an MFA from Alfred University and has maintained an ongoing studio practice and extensive exhibition record for the last twenty years. During this time, he has taught at many notable universities, including Alfred University and New York University. His work has been shown internationally and resides in the permanent collections of several museums including the Smithsonian Museum in Washington (DC), Icheon Museum, World Ceramic Center (Gwango-dong) South Korea, Crocker Museum (CA), Portland Art Museum (OR). He has received various artist’s grants including grants from The Virginia Groot Foundation and the Canada Council on the Arts. The artist says of his work… I think of the subjects in these paintings as voids or impressions where the people and objects used to be, like the footprints of prehistoric peoples left in fossilized mud. The works read as a form of contemporary Vanitas*, where the end is not implied but revealed in the illusion of disappearance. The last two years have been an investigation of the mold making process and experimentation with Illusions caused by negative space. I am not interested in the illusion itself but instead the moment where the object disappears, the instant the perceived positive state gives way to its own disappearance. Facing this transition as a quiet, physical encounter offers a metaphor for our chaotic place in the continuum of human experience. At times, it is captured as an actual change like a ceramic glaze drip. Other times it is implied through sculptural space. These works build on twelve years of exploration of Vanitas* painting in the medium of ceramics, through which I’ve blurred the lines of painting and sculpture. I sometimes imagine that there is another dimension in between two and three dimensional space that I am trying to uncover, and that by pushing the insides outward or pushing the outsides inward I might find a glimpse of that impossibility. I’m continually intrigued by where it leads me.

Creator:

Dirk Staschke (1971)

Creation Year:

2023

Dimensions:

Height: 22 in (55.88 cm)Width: 17 in (43.18 cm)Depth: 1.5 in (3.81 cm)

Medium:

Ceramic

Movement & Style:

Contemporary

Period:

21st Century