PRESENTATION: Sound Of The Earth
The international group exhibition on ceramics in contemporary art “Sound Of The Earth”, is the first exhibition in Switzerland to explore current approaches to this medium. It focuses on artists for whom ceramics have become a core element of their practice, whether as the sole medium or in parallel with painting, sculpture or other media. The exhibition brings together works that experiment with the sculptural potential of ceramics, blurring the boundaries between high art and craft.
By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Kunstmuseum Appenzell Archive
The exhibition “Sound Of The Earth” places a strong focus on the artistic engagement with the Earth, the remnants of past civilizations, and architectural symbolism. Through their works, artists such as Isa Melsheimer, Martin Chramosta, and Clare Goodwin explore architectural fragments and ornamental motifs as vessels of cultural memory and identity. Their practices delve into how built forms become signifiers of societal values and historical narratives. Shahpour Pouyan extends this dialogue through visionary architectural models that evoke the utopian and dystopian dimensions of power, control, and identity. His works suggest imagined architectures that are as much about what is remembered as what is lost or imagined, Ceramics—fragile yet enduring—become a poignant medium for addressing the impermanence of cultural meaning. The material’s inherent delicacy invites reflection on the transitory nature of history and human experience. Artists like Mai-Thu Perret intertwine feminist utopias with traditional craft techniques, crafting speculative visions of alternative social structures. Nicole Cherubini reconfigures vanitas motifs, challenging the weight of classical art historical codes with a bold, contemporary formal language. Edmund de Waal’s refined ceramic installations converse with archives, collections, and the layered histories of specific sites. His minimalist aesthetic often alludes to memory, silence, and displacement. Throughout the exhibition, bodily, botanical, and animalistic forms recur—ambiguous figures that simultaneously suggest strength and vulnerability. Paloma Proudfoot constructs reliefs using dressmaking templates of human anatomy, translating the body into modular, tactile surfaces. Caroline Achaintre draws inspiration from abstraction, pop culture, and folk traditions—particularly the carnivalesque—to create mask-like forms that blur the lines between grotesque and playful. Carmen D’Apollonio works at the intersection of sculpture and design, crafting lamp-like objects with an organic, often humorous sensibility that challenges functional expectations. Central to the exhibition is the artists’ dynamic engagement with the limits and possibilities of ceramics—its form, texture, color, and symbolic resonance. Their experimentation often subverts the material’s conventional association with domesticity and decorative craft. Cristian Andersen produces intricate sculptures that bring together seemingly incompatible forms, materials, and energies, creating a dialogue of contrasts. Lindsey Mendick shapes clay into deceptively familiar domestic objects that evoke personal trauma, decay, and transformation. Woody De Othello reimagines everyday household items as exaggerated, anthropomorphic figures that embody emotional and psychological states. Together, these artists use the medium of ceramics not only to reimagine cultural symbols and histories but also to explore the absurd, the precarious, and the humorous. Their work affirms ceramics as a powerful site for subversion, vulnerability, and reinvention.
Participating Artists: Caroline Achaintrem Cristian Andersen, Nicole Cherubini, Martin Chramosta, Carmen D’apollonio, Woody De Othello, Edmund De Waal, Clare Goodwin, Isa Melsheimer, Lindsey Mendick, Shahpour Pouyan, Paloma Proudfoot, Mai-Thu Perret
Photo: Lindsey Mendick, Wasted, 2023, Glazed ceramic, 20 x 20 x 20 cm, Courtesy the artist and Carl Freedman Gallery, Margate, Photo: Ollie Harrop
Info: Curators: Stefanie Gschwend & Felicity Lunn, Kunstmuseum Appenzell, Unterrainstrasse 5, Appenzell, Switzerland, Duration: 25/5-14/9/2025,Days & Hours: Wed-Fri 12:00-18:00, Sat-Sun 11:00-17:00, https://kunstmuseum-kunsthalle.ch/
