About the class

Now more than ever, art making as relief, art making as tool, art making as catharsis is more than ever necessary for survival. That when we are in times of perceived and true emergency, art is not just an avenue of escapism, but a critical tool of action. “Art in an Emergency” is the subtitle to the book “Funny Weather” by Olivia Laing, published in April 2020 during the peak beginnings of the COVID pandemic, within Trumps first presidency, as well as during Brexit. It is a collection of fragments, essays, love letters, and memories that encompass “the turbulent political weather of the twenty-first century”. Laing’s collection revolves around the necessity of art in an emergency.

This 8 week class will be following the determination, investigation, and feverish need that “Art in an Emergency” depicts. Participants will explore idea generating, building fast techniques, as well as demos on building/altering forms to create pieces influenced by what we know as the body. Each student will choose a part of the body to focus on and will be guided through the class with that fragment in mind. There will be drawing exercises, readings, explorations in repetitive movements with clay, and continuously a return to the body. 

With a focus on Clay and the body, this course will dive into:

• Clay as a somatic receiver
• Ceramics as conservation for our [social]ecosystems/bodys/lived experiences
• Ceramics as connector to our history and our dreamed future
• and clay as teacher in transformation. Navigating these modes of intentional making, we will center the questions of ‘how can art save us in a political emergency?’ ‘What do we create in an emergency?’

About the instructor

Dan Clauson

Instructor / Artist

Daniel is a Queer and Trans Artist focusing mostly in ceramics. Dan utilizes their past experiences of gender dysphoria, relationships, and ‘home’ to influence their work. Connecting contradicting ideas of love and pain, trauma and acceptance, intimacy and ambiguity. From the University of Washington, Daniel received a Bachelors in Art in the 3D4M department, as well as a minor in Art History. Daniel has attended both the University of Colorado (Boulder) and the University of Arkansas (Fayetteville) as a Post Baccalaureate in ceramics. This past Fall, they were one of the 2022 artists in residences at Anderson Ranch Arts Center.