Lauren Mabry
Lauren Mabry
Lauren Mabry (American, b. 1985, Cincinnati, OH) is recognized internationally for her bold, dynamic glazes and inventive use of material, color, and form. Her ceramic vessels, objects, and dimensional paintings embrace experimentation to question the boundary between abstract painting, sculpture, and process art.
Mabry is the recipient of individual grants from the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, the Independence Foundation, and the National Council on Education in the Ceramic Arts Emerging Artist Award, and she has worked at the Jingdezhen International Studio in China and the Gaya Ceramic Art Center in Bali, Indonesia. Mabry has shown in numerous institutions including the Bemis Center for Contemporary Art (Omaha, NE), Fuller Craft Museum (Brockton, MA) and Milwaukee Art Museum (Milwaukee, WI). Her work is in the permanent collections of the Renwick Gallery at the Smithsonian American Art Museum (Washington, D.C.), Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (Kansas City, MO), Daum Museum of Contemporary Art (Sedalia, MO), Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art (Overland Park, KS), and Sheldon Museum of Art (Lincoln, NE).
In 2007, Mabry completed her BFA from Kansas City Art Institute, and she received her MFA from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2012. She has lived in Philadelphia, PA since 2012 and works out of her independent studio. Her work is currently represented by Ferrin Contemporary, Pentimenti Gallery, and Jonathan Ferrara Gallery.
Lauren makes ceramic objects, vessels, and dimensional glaze paintings. Her work seeks to both highlight and exploit the intrinsic qualities and process-oriented nature of ceramics. Through calculated experimentation driven by a fascination with color and visual movement, the objects challenge viewers to contemplate the perceived physical state of matter. These ever-dynamic compositions feature rich, vibrant glazes that remain in constant fluctuation between flowing liquids and solid structures. Sometimes the surfaces look weathered and aged, but at the same time colorfully lush and wet. The results are expressive, bold, and often dichotomous: haphazard yet highly calculated. The glazes, similar to glass, are pushed to new limits as she experiments with heat and the possibilities of material to create a spectrum of flow and gesture in work that carries forward the histories of both glazed ceramic and abstract painting.
