The Space of Clay: an investigation of contemporary clay-based art practice as a site of embodied viewer experience

This thesis interrogates the potential for clay and ceramic artworks to stimulate embodied perception. Numerous studies have examined the phenomenology of art experience, taking account of various forms of practice. Embodied maker experiences of working with clay have also been well documented, yet existing critiques from either standpoint neglect viewer responses to clay-based practices. Inspired by Merleau Ponty’s phenomenology, particularly his later theory of reversibility, this research situates clay and ceramic art firmly within the lens of embodied spectatorship. It maps the profound ways that sculptures, installations and interactive objects made from raw and fired clay might impact audiences, focusing on the unique sensorial, imaginative and conceptual potentials arising from material specificity. Key to this is the social, cultural, temporal and anthropological significance of clay in human life: no other substance is so closely connected with human existence, spanning millennia. This rich material identity is shown to be phenomenologically compelling in distinct ways, thus necessitating the original approach to embodied thinking about clay-based art undertaken by this thesis.

The thesis centres around three research foci: sensorial affect, the agency of crafted identities, and the spatial potentials of ceramic and clay. Drawing on diverse fields of knowledge, each theme probes the philosophical, ontological and experiential resonances of clay-based making. Case studies of five contemporary artists working in ceramic and clay media are integral to the thesis: Sam Bakewell, Phoebe Cummings, Nao Matsunaga, Ingrid Murphy and Johannes Nagel offer crucial maker perspectives. Interviews and analyses of artworks provide vital experiential data whilst also demonstrating theoretical claims. The synthesis of theory with the experiential is fundamental to this interpretive discourse of embodied spectatorship, which places the distinctive qualities of ceramic and clay at the heart of an innovative critical framework—one that reveals the particular embodied character of clay-based art.