Michiko Murakami and Sarah Hummel Jones
Both Michiko Murakami and Sarah Hummel Jones earned master's degrees in ceramics from the Cranbook Academy of Art in 2015. Though formally very distinct from each other, both Murakami's and Jones' works draw on popular culture and use these references as a springboard for deeper associations.
Michiko Murakami on her work
I like to call most of my sculptures "rocks". The stillness, ancientness, humility, accessibility, and universality of what is and what makes a rock a rock provides an excellent canvas for the seemingly irrational combination of images. The drawings on the sculptures, tend to be irreverent, disjointed, graffiti-like, tangential, humorous and dark. This arrangement consists of conflated imagery of Asians, Asian-Americans, Asian-ess, and Asian influence on Americana and American pop culture - with an added tinge of a post-apocalyptic nuclear disaster. They can serve as pseudo-artifacts with wrong/truncated/distorted history presented, denying the viewer access to information as well as denying access to the literal insides of the closed form pieces.
About Michiko Murakami: Michiko Murakami was born and raised in Los Angeles, CA. She received her MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art (2015) and BA from Cal State University, Los Angeles (2009). She currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA.
Sarah Hummel Jones on her work
By layering forms, materials and colors, I create new spaces for an audience to enter. In making these installations, I often draw inspiration from music videos and blipster culture, though the content of my work is not only dependent on these references. Some objects are fully recognizable, while others are ambiguous in order to allow viewers to make their own associations. Ultimately, I want to create a space where people can easily immerse themselves in their imaginations.
About the artist: Sarah Hummel Jones is interdisciplinary artist who works with a variety of materials. Originally from Indiana, she is the youngest of five girls and an identical twin! She graduated from Bowling Green State University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, after graduation she moved to Chicago, IL where she attended the School of the Art Institute Chicago for a year and received a Post-Baccalaureate in Ceramics. She earned a Masters of Fine Art in Ceramics from Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2014. Sarah currently lives and works in Omaha, NE.