Process & Ongoing Research – D'Andrea Bowie

Process & Ongoing Research

d_andreabowie

process and material led sculptor exploring alchemical potential

👩🏼‍🔬🥽🧪🧫 developing some gnarl

👩🏼‍🔬🥽🧪🧫
developing some gnarly surfaces/glazes from gathered and foraged local materials for some upcoming projects (between carving rocks and melting!)
(and non stop with the bucket maintenance 🧽🪣😅🫠)

Solstice (black) swan taking some heat 🔥

Solstice (black) swan taking some heat 🔥

third arm (wax, wood, wild-ish clay) a busy, blos

third arm (wax, wood, wild-ish clay)
a busy, blossom-y spring 🌼🌞

all the songs I know so far, 2015-16 (sculpture w

all the songs I know so far, 2015-16
(sculpture with accompanying music piece written in collab with my son, whom, among many wonderful traits is also an autistic person)

Reflecting on this collaboration from my undergrad years, prompted by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s recent dangerous and dehumanizing words on autism. I write more about it in my spring newsletter.

“We accept our thing-ness intellectually but the emotional acceptance of it can be a joy.” Paul Thek

Happy spring! 🌱 Lots cooking, first few pics, f

Happy spring! 🌱 Lots cooking, first few pics, fresh bronze and steel fired with slip cast ceramic toast, breads, pies and smokes (finally cast that pie in ceramics geez, took me long enough!) lots of testing still but some things starting to come together for upcoming projects!

These first few sentences of my artist statement remaining pretty consistent for the past 10-15 years. (Studio times 🖤)

…My research centers on the porous relationship between material and method. As a sculptor and maker, I’m driven by the exciting possibilities that emerge through exploring the interplay between process and material.

Wow wow! Swans in the field beside our house, holy

Wow wow! Swans in the field beside our house, holy! 🖤🔮🦢#tgif

Ceramic smokes 🖤 (celebrating not quitting quit

Ceramic smokes 🖤 (celebrating not quitting quitting)

My first smokes were with a Czech girl in Germany at our models apt way back in the 90s, we were all pretty broke and she taught me how roll Drum tobacco. I was 17, out in the world on my own and no longer Mormon:) I eventually settled on lucky lights as mostly I loved the package and the motto, “it’s toasted“ made me laugh 🎯 anyways, smoking is awful/wonderful and super hard to quit, don’t start!

Voting day! Slumped glass piece made in 2016 durin

Voting day! Slumped glass piece made in 2016 during last wtf US election, (as shown on Facebook memories lol) is resonating.

Happy solstice! ✨ Studio day cleaning (and list

Happy solstice! ✨

Studio day cleaning (and listening to Danzig 🖤) reflecting on a big year of making art while preparing for a talk next month @cdnclayandglass where I will be presenting on many years of research- and the topics I get the most jazzed about 🕺🏻Clay, glass, and studio sustainability 🤗register link in link tree 🥦 check out the line up, there are going to be some great talks, super honoured to be included. 🏹

From @cdnclayandglass website

(Photo cred to Ost last pic! @myllypede @yorkuampd )

Fall to Center has come to a close but if yr walki

Fall to Center has come to a close but if yr walking down Queen W past the @airdgallery u may view collected moving fragments of studio process via the windows at street level until Jan 24. (When I was in my 20s I worked as a foley assistant, it’s been fun revisiting- full video online soon.)

The double basement windows will also screen a video featuring a scroll-thru of @slowrealz an insta account I started in response to feeling overwhelmed w social media, an effort to skip real and beautiful moments into the algorithm. (Sound on for some kid wisdom!)

As always, thank u Carla, @garnetcarla for the trust, for handing keys over these past few months and allowing me to truly inhabit the space- a wonderful gift for an artist.

“According to Bowie, art affects intuitive secrets between the material world, the creator, and the viewer.” Carla Garnet, director/curator, Aird Gallery

Images of exhibition on my website, online catalogue coming soon

Glaze/glass magic w copper inclusions ✨

Glaze/glass magic w copper inclusions ✨

Semester fatigue? T’is almost there my friends!

Semester fatigue? T’is almost there my friends! TGIF!

Fun times happened! Joyful moments teaching intro to ceramics @yorkuampd we love making stuff!!

thx to TA-extraordinaire Jules @hometown_happenstance for the pic of giving Dino swan a Terra sig bath AND for many good laughs along the way! A pleasure working w u! 😊

Happy birthday to my newly turned 12 yr old! Memor

Happy birthday to my newly turned 12 yr old! Memories in my phone popped this image up of my guy with work made in 2017 part of my @ocaduniversity undergrad thesis. Titled, ‘The Mother’, this ceramic sound piece positioned beneath a glass stained window of swamp paper, featured tiny pots emitting baby babble, highlighting a special time of pre-language that I was lucky enough to be with. I love this shot so much, my baby listening to himself (or maybe the universal baby ❤️)

I really really love making bowls! My exhibition @

I really really love making bowls! My exhibition @airdgallery wraps Dec 14 and I’m closing it out w a bowl drop!

I’ve been making with clay for over 15 years now and while I sculpt with many materials, ceramics feels most like home and I enjoy the comfort of a familiar relationship, being able to relax into it- calm spiralling thoughts, connect hands and brain and tune out. I don’t sell my functional ware as I’m no pro and I’d be worried about losing the joy making them brings!

During covid I only made pots and bowls while figuring out how to make glazes, it was so relieving to be held that way during such an unsettling time. Coil after coil, chasing shadows away.

This past year has been particularly challenging and I’ve made a bunch of bowls on some dark days that are beautiful functional pieces. My bowls, painterly, a lil messy, imperfect and a bit raucous reflect my joy of making and level up yr eating experience:) Made w food safe cone 6 glazes, on the large side, they r the perfect size for ramen, soups or salads. A special treat for yourself or a great gift. 🏹🥣

I’ll be at the gallery nov 30, dec 7, dec 14 from 1-5 come and get yours! Show me a donation receipt to a charity of your choice, min suggested $100 per bowl and take your pick. Super broke but really want a bowl? Will accept volunteer hrs to charity if yr choice- the food bank needs lots of extra hands this time of year!

Not sure what charity? My top picks.. (links in linktree 🌳)

INARA – International Network for Aid, Relief & Assistance

local food bank

@airdgallery is a registered charity, one of the few public galleries in Toronto, the gallery makes space for many artists to show their work thx to the vision of @garnetcarla 🦋💙

Special thx to York University Sculpture dept for use of kiln while I figure out my power woes! ✨🙏

Thx all for the birthday wishes! ❤️ super lo

Thx all for the birthday wishes! ❤️

super long road, extra grateful to spend the day teaching and making art 🕺🏻 ✨ (4 kids and 10 yrs of school later! 🤪)

Toni Morrison // "It’s not possible to constantly hone in on the crisis. You have to have the love and you have to have the magic, that’s also life."

Thx York University Sculpture dept for the use of kiln while I sort mine out!! 🔥

Full moon tonight! 🌚 Fall to Center, my exhibit

Full moon tonight! 🌚 Fall to Center, my exhibition enters its last month, closing on Dec 15. @airdgallery Pictured is a glass piece I blew with copper and glass dancing 💃🏻 @pilchuckglassschool last spring with the addition of a cast wax cow horn.

Titled BD 500, this piece explores biodynamic principles I learned about while my kids attended Waldorf school. At times strange yet deeply resonating, Steiner and anthroposophy (the word coming from the Greek anthropos/human and Sophia/wisdom) outlines practical rituals to celebrate the spirit of working with the land. I have written a bit more about my time at Pilchuck on ‘ye ol’ blog or news/letters w a link on the link tree 🌳 You can even sign up for news/letters when I figure out how! Lol

Special thanks to all my classmates at Pilchuck, our talented instructor @jenniferbuenostudio the best TAs @curios_glass pictured, helping me spin that crazy thing and @zachabellaglass (photo cred!) and @suzymmelo for yr breath and friendship in this piece. And all the people there that fed me literally and in spirit!! Such a special place and time 💜🕺🏻❤️ @pilchuckglassschool taught me so much about community.

Special gratitude to @airdgallery director, curator @garnetcarla ❤️💃🏻

First photo @lfdocumentation and further show doc on my website

Sacred hearts hold fast the black swan is on the w

Sacred hearts hold fast
the black swan is on the water
🖤🦢🖤🦢🖤🦢🖤

The Swan
Rainer Maria Rilke

This laboring of ours with all that remains undone, as if still bound to it, is like the lumbering gait of the swan.
And then our dying—releasing ourselves from the very ground on which we stood— is like the way he hesitantly lowers himself
into the water. It gently receives him, and, gladly yielding, flows back beneath him, as wave follows wave, while he, now wholly serene and sure, with regal composure, allows himself to glide.

A black swan event doesn’t necessarily mean the negative, its unpredictable nature while unsettling indicates a struggle to transcend 🩶 scar clan, we have been here before 🖤💔

Burping my hot sauce whilst real child games w pal

Burping my hot sauce whilst real child games w pals on the interweb (if u have sound on) 🦭💨 living my best Mary Pratt life in 2024 ✨ (maybe not tell u how I cut all those peppers without gloves and gave myself some pretty good burny fingers for 2 days!)

Gratitude for spending time in leaves eating apple

Gratitude for spending time in leaves eating apples w a lovely group @airdgallery last Saturday. I don’t usually like pics of myself but this pic tells it all! 😄🍂🍎❤️🍁

ceramic bowl drop coming up in November…

Today 12:30 @airdgallery Cast glass, kombucha bot

Today 12:30 @airdgallery

Cast glass, kombucha bottle and copper on the left, bullseye in the middle and crystal on the right. ✨2023

Happy to be showing these cast glass works, I’ll be speaking about the time I spent making them at the most amazing, magical place where I learned so much @penlandschool in 2023 (a community that is facing devastating consequences after hurricane Helene).

These pieces make me so happy and hold many beautiful memories of kinship, trust, vulnerability.. ❤️ and lots of river floating!

📸 @lfdocumentation

Load More Follow on Instagram