Falling Leaves by Carol Bradley is our exhibition for the month of October. Carol Bradley is a ceramic artist with a BFA from the University of Lethbridge (AB) and an MFA from the University of Waterloo (ON). She has received numerous grants from The Canada Council and the Ontario Arts Council, as well as various awards for academic and artistic achievement. Her work has been shown both nationally and internationally, including exhibitions in the USA, New Zealand, Japan, Switzerland, and Taiwan.
In addition to her studio artwork, she has been involved in many public and community art projects. She was Kitchener’s Artist in Residence in 1996, and received the Kitchener-Waterloo Arts Award for Visual Arts in 2006.
Together with her partner, Tilman Lichter, she ran an art tile studio, RIVERTILE, from 2001 – 2011 in Kitchener. The studio specialized in the design and production of handmade tiles and tile products, including private and public ceramic installations.
Carol moved to Howick in 2012 where she and Tilman are currently renovating a 1860 house in the village of Fordwich. During the school year she gives clay workshops for the Foundation for Education, and has volunteered as a clay teacher at Howick Central School. In 2016, a collaborative tile mural involving the students and staff at the school was completed and installed on the outside wall at the main entrance of the building.
Falling Leaves
Falling Leaves by Carol Bradley is an reflection where she uses the clay vessel to explore our relationship with the natural world.
Hand-built, organic and irregular in form, these vessels make reference to natural objects such as gourds, seed pods or cocoons. Their earthy rough surfaces evoke the greens, browns and rusts of rock, tree bark and lichen, while their thin-walled fragility and presentation – hanging, or simply balanced – remind us of the delicate balance found in nature.
At the same time, the container-like forms refer to domestic and ritual function and recall the history of early utensils and containers, which were found directly in nature or made with very simple technologies.
By evoking the forms and surfaces found in nature, I want to remind us of our inevitable and necessary connection to the natural world.
