The influence of Asian aesthetics on contemporary American ceramics is nothing new. But for local ceramicist Dale Huffman, it is profoundly personal. “There was something about the aesthetic and the culture that really resonated with me,” Huffman recalls about his first trip to Japan in 1996. There, he attended the International Workshop for Ceramics in Tokoname. “At the time, I told people that I went to Japan to stand on the edge of a cliff, and somewhere over there I leapt,” says Huffman, chair of the fine arts department at Carlow College, where he is an assistant professor of fine arts. “That’s how I felt. It was very liberating.” For more than two decades prior to that first trip, Huffman had worked as a production potter creating functional works out of porcelain that were characterized by clean shapes glazed with loose, brushy overlays. But after that trip and the resultant liberating leap, he says he experienced a “quantum shift” in his personal approach to making pots. “I became much less interested in round pots,” Huffman says. “Not that I disliked them or thought that anything was wrong with them, but I was much less interested in making them, and I became much more interested in making pots that were a lot more organic and expressive.” Now, some eight years later, Huffman asks visitors to his exhibition, “Painted by Fire,” at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts in Shadyside to take a similar liberating leap when looking at the 100 plus pots, bowls, bottles, tea bowls and saki cups by him on display in a second-floor gallery there. After all, Huffman’s recent works are not the kind of thing you’d find at Pottery Barn. With their asymmetrical walls, occasional indents and uneven glazes that sometimes give way to craggy surface textures, they are far from it. But make no mistake about it. These are beautiful, organically inspired objects that take on a life of their own. For example, on one shelf several small “ochoko,” or saki cups look like they have small, alien faces on them. On another, a lineup of small bottles in graduated sizes look as though they are dancing. And on the walls, large platters and small square plates are as individual as people themselves, each having a uniqueness thanks to evidence of the potter’s hand in lumpy forms and finger scrapings. Creating these works, Huffman says, is more of a process of working with the clay and the firing process rather than trying to control it. That goes a long way in explaining the organic look and feel of these works, he says. After creating his pots, Huffman fires them in his own wood fired kiln, which he built himself in 1998. During the firing process, the ash from the wood produces a natural glaze. Different woods produce different ash, hence the glazes vary in color in one way or another — ranging from dull browns to fiery oranges. Each piece has a certain tactile quality thanks to the wood ash flying around the blazing kiln and the seashells used to separate each piece, which keeps them from sticking to each other during firing. The natural glaze can sometimes build up around the seashells to create interesting surface designs that can be seen throughout many of the pieces in this show. The effect is particularly appealing on several of the wall-hung plates and the three large bottles that are set in the center of the gallery on pedestals, which in their own right offer an interesting combination of modern lines and forms inspired by antiquity. Since his initial trip, Huffman has twice returned to Japan. Once, in 2000, through a cultural exchange program in Saitama, Japan; and again in 2002, when he showed his work in the Mashiko International Ceramics Contest in Mashiko, Japan. The 2002 trip saw him winning a judges’ commendation award. But, he says, in recent years his work has evolved to take on influences beyond those of Japanese origin, such as those seen in the large bottles. Although he admits that the Asian influence “is so pervasive that it’s hard to get out from under,” Huffman says that if viewers look long enough they will see that his current work combines both Eastern and Western sensibilities. “A lot of Americans think my pots are very Japanese and a lot of Japanese think my pots are very American,” Huffman says. But in the end, no matter how one sees them, Huffman’s pots are indeed interesting regardless of what influenced them. Additional Information:

Details

‘Painted by Fire’ What: Ceramic works by Dale Huffman. When: Through Aug. 15. Hours: 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays and Wednesdays; 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays. Where: Pittsburgh Center for the Arts, 6300 Fifth Ave., Shadyside. Details: (412) 361-0873 or www.pittsburgharts.org .

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