To Wonder & Wander

I am a person in love with a thing called fiction. A story that is invented to entertain or deceive. This passion for invented stories, for mythology, informs my work. For a narrative to be convincing, a narrative that engages and enthralls there must be layers, there must be detail or I won’t believe. My current work is an attempt to create mythic ornate contraptions that allow for communications beyond this world. The word “contraptions” connotes images of amateur inventors creating strange and odd mechanisms, often ridiculous and fantastical. I began with the simplistic formal beauty of the conical. The form used for non-electric telephones called speaking tubes or voicepipes, early devices based around two cones and a pipe through which speech can be transmitted and received. Voicepipes were used for communication in large office buildings, affluent houses, expensive cars,early airplanes, and most notably in ships, specifically warships. My sculptural contraptions also reference other conical forms: funnels, megaphones, dunce caps, caution cones, and satellite dishes. Each of these objects has a myriad of connotations, both practical and symbolic. For example, the dunce cap usually thought to denote idiocy was originally worn by Dunsmen, the followers of philosopher John Duns Scotus. The Dunsmen believed that the conical dunce cap would funnel learning down to the wearer. Some believe an inverted funnel is a symbol of madness. I am not interested in the actual mechanics of early inventions, but the simplicity of ideas of connection, the wonderment of magical thinking, and the charm of constructed forms. Through process I try to satisfy my curiosity for sumptuous fluid surfaces, and ideas of accumulation and myth. Utilizing the amorphous properties of clay, while exploring its inherent materiality I create fanciful objects that feel both familiar and alien.

Tammie Rubin is an artist whose ceramic sculpture explores invented narratives utilizing unrecognizable objects and ideas of the role of ornament and trophy in our daily lives. Rubin received her MFA, in Ceramics, from the University of Washington. She has exhibited nationally, both in solo and group exhibitions. Her work has also appeared in numerous journals and newspapers, including Ceramics: Art & Perception, Ceramics Monthly, and The Seattle Times. Tammie Rubin currently lives and works in Champaign, IL. where she is an Assistant Professor of Ceramics & Foundations at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, her undergraduate alma mater.