Forms of Inheritance

Forms of Inheritance at Houston Center for Contemporary Craft
January 30 - May 8, 2021
Review for Momus by Laura August
Review by Sherry Cheng

Anna Mayer’s social and sculptural practice explores the impact of humanity throughout geologic time, with a focus on the temporal relationship between humans and the land beyond an individual’s life span. Her work in the exhibition reflects deeply upon the realities of death and decay. Drawing upon a language of mourning and burial practices, she uses materials like raw clay and porcelain dinnerware to communicate a narrative of what remains when people die and what is left for others to inherit. By grinding pieces of dinnerware she inherited and mixing the bits with raw clay to give it a new texture and purpose, she creates sculptures that appear to seep and bubble-up from the ground. These ceramic works are juxtaposed with a pair of bronze hands and feet that are cast from a composite of Mayer’s own body, along with the fingers and toes of others from communities in Los Angeles and Houston, where the artist has lived. By combining attributes from different people to form a new body, Mayer identifies a need for a society that relies on the collective strength of individuals…. [more writing about the show]

Installation view. Background: Caribbean Petroleum Fire Near San Juan, Puerto Rico in 2009 , 2021; printed fabric with holes created while crushing inherited dinnerware; 193 x 144 inches

Fireful of Fear: Store These Records in a Safe Deposit Box or Other Secure Place (Kanan Dume) , 2008-2018; wild-fired ceramic; 20 x 16.5 W x 3 inches

In the foreground are three Fireful of Fear sculptures (2008-2018). Background right: Coringa Drive on the Day the Woolsey Fire Started in 2018 , 2021; printed fabric with holes created while crushing inherited dinnerware; 108 x 144 inches

Fireful of Fear: A Perfect Country Would Have More of Me (Escondido Canyon) , 2008-2018; wild-fired ceramic; 20.5 x 16.5 W x 3.5 inches

Fireful of Fear postcards, 2009-2020; custom-printed postcards; each card is 4 x 6 inches

Installation of Mourning Ware sculptures, 2019-2021

[center] Mourning Ware (Layers) , 2021; inherited crushed dinnerware embedded in purchased clay, layered with gleaned clays from Niland, CA and Houston, TX 11 in. x 10 in. diameter

Obvara Mourning Ware (Freestanding Funeral Fringe) , 2020; inherited crushed dinnerware embedded in purchased clay, obvara-fired; cut up discarded inner tube; 18 in. diameter

Mourning Ware (Mount) , 2020; inherited crushed dinnerware and Niland, CA clay embedded in purchased clay; 16 in. x 21 in. x 11 in.

Mourning Ware with Inner Tubes 2 , 2020; inherited crushed dinnerware embedded in purchased clay; gleaned clays from Niland, CA and Houston, TX; discarded inner tubes and belts; 7 ft diameter

Seeping and Squandering (Earth Should Return - Houston) , 2021; Mourning Ware Vessel with Seep Lip; Sculpey® model for an unrealized arm sculpture; ceramic sifters for sorting crushed inherited dinnerware; sweatsuit made of recreated Victorian era

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