Blake Kennedy

Blake holds a BFA in Studio Art with concentrations in ceramics and sculpture from Appalachian State University.  He currently works as the Clay Studio Manager at North Carolina State University's Crafts Center.   Exhibitions include Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, OH; The Blowing Rock Museum of Art and History, Blowing Rock, NC; Rockport Center for the Arts, Rockport, TX; and the Butler Art Center, Butler, PA. In addition to an active studio practice, he enjoys spending time with his wife, Kimberly, their two dogs, two cats, and six chickens.

Constantly drawn to nature’s many different landscapes, my central interest is in liminal areas between a landscape’s changing topography.  For example, where an ocean meets a shoreline.  This space is never static.  Instead, it remains a visual example of the landscape’s constant flux.  These ambiguous points of transition ruminate, and in doing so, provide moments of reflection, memory, and growth.  In a similar way, I think of working with clay as a liminal process.  The material goes through constant transformation as the object is being formed.  The pieces I make reference the different landscapes I have experienced, and the impressions they have left on me.  My studio practice alternates between exploring these landscapes through utilitarian pieces, and investigating them in more sculptural installation based works.