|
Scott Chatenever at Ventura County Potters' Guild
By Anonymous — Tuesday, November 18th, 2014
Ojai resident, Scott Chatenever will be the speaker for November and will show his work following chronological threads to illustrate the development of ideas and themes. He will touch on influences and mentors, the interplay between concept and process, important/liberating/defining questions, and future plans. “I remember being five years old and looking at the fossils in my backyard. At that age I was convinced I would find a dinosaur. But what captured my imagination was that I was literally holding a chunk of life millions of years old. I wondered, “What more than a speck of fossil could I possibly hope to produce in my short life when viewed from 40 million years in the future?” Maybe it’s ironic then, that I live in a time when humans will make such a huge impact, both biologic and geologic. “I believe our perception is profoundly and relentlessly impacted by mass media, and as a result our experience becomes ever more symbolic, iconographic, and virtualized. Humans no longer determine value without symbols, and more disturbingly, we rarely experience our senses directly without our conditioning getting in the way. Our food and almost every other aspect of our lives is not experienced, but consumed as a commodity. Its value is determined not by ripeness, freshness or wholesomeness, but implied by a familiar brand, color or shape. My art attempts to once again engage the viewer’s primary senses, if only for a moment, by appealing to the hunter-gatherer still in all of us and forcing the question, “Is it good?” Chatenever makes sculpture, pottery, and custom tile at his new studio in Ojai. An area resident since 1976, he has worked in clay for almost 20 years. He has taught workshops at the Mendocino Art Center, Hui No’Eau Visual Arts Center, and Black Mountain Center for the Arts, and he has studied and collaborated with other artists at the Archie Bray Foundation, and at Penland, Haystack, and Arrowmont Schools of Craft. He earned a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California at San Diego. He also enjoys gardening, cooking, surfing, and raising chickens. Some of Scott's work will be available for sale. All ages are welcome! Who: Ventura County Potters' Guild |
