Amanda Dobbratz
Amanda Dobbratz
Red clay is more fun and harder to mess up. I handbuild to escape round pots, yet still make round pots. I find the most beauty and joy in the slightly absurd and faintly ridiculous. I believe that more is more. High and low culture are best mixed. It takes practice to make it look like you’re not trying. Patterns are my language. I pine for the desert and hoard old fabric. Making art is work and I like it that way. Rules help me think less and be more free. Sometimes it’s all about aesthetics. It doesn’t matter if you don’t get my jokes. My work is deadly serious, and I take it seriously.
I make functional ceramics made from low-fired earthenware using handbuilding techniques. I work to create a sense of studied casualness and play within my work, contrasting lumpy fingerprints left by the making process with crisp sgraffito lines and geometric surface design. My surface patterning and color palette references the desert landscape, body ornamentation, and historical textiles.