Carl Richard Söderström
Ceramicist
Stockholm, Sweden
Recommended by Konsthantverkcentrum
The physical expression of clay
- Carl Richard creates abstract and nature-influenced clay sculptures
- His ambiguous pieces are at times unsettling and challenging
- He is represented in major museums in Sweden and around the world
Carl Richard Söderström makes large-scale abstract ceramic sculptures from black stoneware clay. After initially training in glass and as a painter, he became a ceramicist because he felt it offered him more freedom. “Ceramics allow me to express my ideas and convey an impactful message,” he says. Carl Richard’s pieces are complex, created in many layers, and feature ideas concerned with identity, what it is to be human and how we experience nature. At the heart of his practice is a strong making process that is often more important to him than the finished piece. Through his process, Carl Richard pushes limits, complicates concepts, creates problems and then makes art out of solving them. Pieces are finished with glaze and pigments and undergo multiple firings.
INTERVIEW
I first trained in ceramics in my twenties, before moving to painting and then earning my MFA from Konstfack in Stockholm in glass. After Konstfack I decided to go back to ceramics. I had avoided it because I did not think it was challenging enough and I had not seen any ceramic work that had impressed me much. But I had this need to express myself and it was so much easier to start a ceramic workshop rather a glass one.
It is a silent, slow and intimate process. I must submit to the nature of the clay, giving it time, which creates a certain presence and room for rest and reflection. Clay is an amazing material and there are no limits to what can be done. Working in large scale is a very physical experience, almost as if the piece comes straight out of my own body. The fact that I never really had any artistic role models working in ceramics makes me feel free to go my own way.
I use the same traditional ceramic techniques as others did thousands of years ago to build the structure of my sculptures. As I trust the structure to hold, I am free to be spontaneous and start experimenting in my search for a stronger and more personal expression.
I aim to create ambiguity that awakens something genuine in people, maybe starting a process inside them that makes them think or feel. A visitor leaving my exhibition once told me that my sculptures made her feel physically ill. I want people to feel touched by my art and react in any way possible, perhaps gaining another perspective on the world.
