Rima Suqi’s recent story on artist Paul Briggs in Galerie Magazine pulls into focus his 2 bodies of work.

We loved reading Rima’s profile of gallery artist Paul Briggs in Galerie Magazine‘s Art + Culture column.
We have been showing Paul’s pinched pots for over 10 years now and have sold many of his pieces to our favorite clients and collections. What came into clearer focus in Rima’s reporting was the symbiotic relationship between his 2 ongoing bodies of work — the formal slab-constructed work that requires time to dry between steps and the more spontaneous pinched vessels:

Pinching, once something he did while his slabs stiffened, has become its own discipline–a regular “nightcap,” he says. “You have to pay attention to every pinch or else you’ll just rip that clay away from the whole,” states Briggs, who estimates he’s pinched several thousand pieces in his storied career.

Here is the link to the full article.

This video from Paul’s residency at Penland is wonderful introduction to his work, process and inspiration:

Paul Briggs discovered clay in high school and the material has remained his medium. Since 2016, his work has followed 2 paths, the meditative (zoning out) and the contemplative (zeroing in). He expresses them both in ceramics. The pinched pots allow him a release from the expectation of perfection in life and work that can take the joy out of making.

Each piece is realized from a single ball of clay to which he neither adds nor subtracts. With these works made in stoneware, he immerses himself in tactile virtuosity focusing on the visual transition from row to row of leaf or petal, being guided by nature and the material he has allotted himself.

Briggs was born in 1963 and grew up in New York’s Hudson Valley. His interests have ranged from art and education to rabbinical literature, and back again to ceramics where the creative and spiritual combine in his current practice. He holds degrees from City College, Oral Roberts, Penn State, Massachusetts College of Art and Design, and the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University, where he is now an assistant professor.