The Journal of Australian Ceramics Vol 53 No 2 July 2014

Focus: Em erging
Convergence: Andrei Davidoff
By Varia Karipoff
For sculptor and ceramic artist Andrei
Davidoff, last year held opportunities and
tests in almost equal measure. I hesitate to
ask directly whether he thinks he has kept his
two practices - functional and conceptual -
growing equally apace, and whether they are
coming to a kind of resolution .
His solo exhibition The Speicherring
Project, shown at Craft in September,
provided an opportunity to interrogate him
obliquely'. " The Speicherring Project,"
he said, "is a synthesis of functional ceramic
and sculptural elements. The premise was to
bring the two together." It has been several
years since Davidoff took to using clay in his
sculptural practice, instead favouring wood
and found objects in large-scale architectural
interventions. This most recent exhibition
featured lead vessels that reference the
functional, though are rendered sculptural
and distinct from traditional clay forms by
their material, which is toxic. Large ceramic
bowls echoed the shape of outsized satellite
dishes rather than anything you would find
in a domestic setting, and the large ceramic
vessels resembled something out of an industrial application. Three oil paintings of the world's largest
radio telescope in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, unlocked key concerns of Davidoff's - our relationship to
architectural spaces and how those spaces then relate to landscape. The connections between the five
series of works are non-lineal; he invited the audience to discover links between the separate pieces. In
a roundabout way, Davidoff answered my question about his functional and sculptural practices: "They
took time to resolve because I intentionally held them separate." The Speicherring Project, named
after the Hadron Collider, was intended to forcibly bring the two together, to collide them, if you will.
Tension between the two strands of his practice will always exist, though Davidoff now doesn't see his
themes varying that much. As he deals with the everyday at his potter's wheel, there is still containment,
space, the inside of the bowl or pot and how it relates to its outside form. The day before his exhibition
opening, his production-ware was featured in a prominent design blog . In a modest firestorm of
attention and interest, he picked up several large commissions from a Melbourne interior design firm.
A new restaurant and a design marquee beyond the velvet rope of the Bird Cage at the Spring Racing
Carnival were simultaneous projects that tested the mettle of his home studio set up. "I work from
20 THE 10URNAl OF AUSTRALIAN CERAMICS JULY 2014