Thannie Phan — 'Hold Onto Something' Dotted Sculptural Vessel, 2026

The making unfolds in small, repetitive motions. Very thin fine coils are stacked, pinched into form, shapes emerging and dissolving before settling into themselves. This rhythm of making is what gives the work its surprising lightness, separating it from the density of traditional ceramic works. The coils are grafted, rather than formed in a singular sequence. Each coil is no more than half a centimetre thick. The indentations along each coil come from my fingers, pinching, compressing and smoothing the clay, guiding form through repetition. The uneven ridges show where one coil ends and another begins.  The sharp edges mark the moment I choose to stop, an indication that the work is finished(You can actually count how many coils have made up a single vessel). I work with very thin washes of glazes as the clay body, now light and porous, accepts only so much more. Pigments are brushed on or sometimes pressed through using old newspaper. The surface then absorbs or resists, colour decides to settle or shift in between the fine lines, light gets drawn in or repelled (Paper draws out the water from the oxides, leaving behind a more concentrated colour than brushing).

For this collection, most of the works exist in pairs, in opposition to each another, or together with one another. Some pairs share the same form, but not the surface. Others share a surface, but not a form. Inspired by the poem Anecdote of the Jar by Wallace Stevens, where a jar is set down on a hill, and the entire landscape seems to reorganising itself around it, these pieces do the same for one other, re-arranging how each other is perceived.