Breaking symmetry: the structure and dynamics of form in ceramics

This project examined how the structure and dynamics in ceramics could be made to implement energy and change in the vessel form. A key objective was to clarify how the initial concept of symmetry in Antiquity, concerned with beauty, harmony, rhythm, balance and proportional relationships, changed. In this diachronic study of the concept of symmetry from an aesthetic point of view, the traditional viewing of the concept of ‘harmony of proportion’ can have the limitations sometimes implicit in symmetry — sameness, repetitiveness and indifference. In contrast to this vague notion of the concept, the changed modern viewing of symmetry is strictly geometrical, and absolutely precise. Like symmetry, asymmetry has dual aspects of significance, such as change, motion, dynamics, incongruence, disorder, chaos; another aspect is contrast, non-uniformity, diversity, freedom, individuality. For artists the new kind of space (curved space) offered by science signified such a new freedom to depart from earlier constraints. Picasso utilised this freedom in his ceramics, while ceramicists such as George Ohr, Peter Voulkos, Hans Coper and Edmund de Waal took advantage of both the dynamics and the freedom. Their contributions are considered to have formed the background to my own practice through their breaking of symmetry. This period of my ceramic practice was motivated by an exploration of various ways to continue to “break” symmetry to create new ceramic forms. My studio work ran in parallel with my theoretical research, influencing each other reciprocally in carrying out basic symmetry breaking operations as well as multiple operations for compound vessel forms. This body of work was inspired by fieldwork undertaken in Trento, Italy. This project offers to today’s ceramic artists, a wider, updated perception of symmetry/asymmetry, a broader understanding of its reciprocity and studio methodologies to explore its application.