REFUGE BLUE, porcelain and wood sculpture

Sculpture from the “Refuges” series in glazed porcelain placed on its raw oak base by Dora Stanczel.
A unique piece harmoniously combining architecture and craftsmanship like a modernist fortified residence clinging to its cliff.

Inspiration: It is a constant search for harmony that the artist speaks of as follows: “I like to tame porcelain with a sharp eye: accepting deformation, triggering mistakes, reusing what is thrown away, reintegrating what is broken and thus diverting the technical process. I work with the mistakes that occur in my creative process: I reproduce them by shaping an aesthetic language based on the search for the limit of the material. I focus on the loss of control in manufacturing. »

It is a process in which craftsmanship must strengthen collaboration with the material, challenging the boundary between mastery and control, perfection and accident, chance and the expected. The nature of porcelain is strongly linked to the nature of the accidental. This material, which has a reputation for being capricious, retains the memory of everything that has happened to it with a great possibility of deformation. When processing in the high-temperature kiln, everything will become visible and congealize in the porcelain

French artist, Dora Stanczel after obtaining a master’s degree in arts and science and following numerous training courses with best porcelain artists in Europe, she opened her own ceramic workshop in 2015 in La Rochelle. Since then she has developed an aesthetic language following long experiments with porcelain. Its refined and luxurious porcelain pieces combine exceptional craftsmanship and unique sophistication.

Behind the curves or golden ripples, images of the ocean and waves appear. The aquatic landscape is a constant inspiration for Dora who sails every week on the ocean in La Rochelle. Seeing the curves and waves or facing the winter wind gives a feeling of humility and understanding of nature. Porcelain is as difficult to master as sailing the ocean where you always have to be prepared for the unexpected. This attitude leads the artist to imagine working with porcelain as an ode to collaboration with the accidental and the acceptance of pushing one’s limits.

“My pieces are the fruit of long experiments where technical processes are diverted. I obtain the harmony of forms by constantly seeking the limit of the material. I tear, I fold, I deform, I glue, I drop the porcelain “a specific way that reveals the fragility and strength of matter. I reuse, I reintegrate and I push the process to the extreme.”