Defense Date
2026
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts
Department
Craft/Material Studies
First Advisor
A. Blair Clemo
Second Advisor
Elissa Armstrong
Third Advisor
Susie Ganch
Fourth Advisor
Jack Wax
Abstract
A Mutant Perfect examines how embodied knowledge can be made visible and transmissible through ceramic figures. The research asks what forms emerge when making is understood as a mode of thinking rather than a vehicle for pre-formed ideas, and how those forms might activate somatic recognition in a viewer. The primary method is coil-built ceramic sculpture. Color is applied in layered coats and removed by hand-sanding to expose varying strata beneath, producing a speckled, worn surface. In a second approach, pigment is built directly into the clay body through coil construction, making color structural rather than applied. Narrative prose and poetry accompany the figures, written as a secondary mode of processing what the making produced. This process generates figures that carry the history of their own making on their surface. Viewers encounter these histories somatically, through bodily recognition that precedes conscious interpretation. The work proposes that recognition of shared bodily condition is both the structure of empathy and the structure of making.
Rights
© The Author
Is Part Of
VCU University Archives
Is Part Of
VCU Theses and Dissertations
Date of Submission
5-7-2026