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Fracture and Fragment

"Every act of creation is first an act of destruction." Pablo Picasso

Sandra Shashou’s new body of work, comprising of arrangements of smashed fragments of bone china tea sets, oscillates between modalities of dissolution and reformulation, order and rupture, and historical eras.

Her source material is the bone china produced by Europe’s finest porcelain manufacturers, as the titles of her works indicate – Hamilton, Argyle, Tuscan, Royal Albert, Wedgwood, Limoges, Meito hand-painted and Cobalt – and collected by her from dealers and flea markets. The designs range across centuries and topographies: in one work the lemons and blues of Art Deco, in another the crimson of Edwardian and Victorian designs, and in a third the blue tracery of Chinoiserie.

Shashou brings these tea sets back to her studio and using a small hammer she shatters, punctures, chips and fragments. And yet the shapes of the original crockery are somehow preserved and repurposed in her intricate constructions. The curves of the broken tea sets undulate across simple rectangular surfaces, or swirl around rotundas with a baroque flamboyance. In some the pieces lock tightly together as if part of some giant Cubist puzzle, in other shards seem to be caught in the freeze frame of a constructivist explosion. Her chromatically rich, harmonious works match crimsons, mustard yellows and pinks, or mauve, turquoise and blue. Set in a gold or white ground, Shashou’s fragments unfold like Jackson Pollock’s all-over paintings – only shattered, not splattered.

Shashou has found inspiration in the Japanese art of Kintsugi, in which broken bowls were repaired with beautiful golden joins, so fashionable in the 17th century, that people were accused of deliberately smashing valuable pottery so it could be remade in this manner.

Some may read a social comment in her work, a playful rupturing of bourgeois values. The order and tranquillity of a daily routine, with its echoes of Victorian Britain, Alice in Wonderland and social conformity, tea-time, has been literally shattered.

Shashou herself prefers to foreground the emotional and biographical metaphors embedded in the work. Smashing crockery is, after all, a time-honoured feature of the lovers’ row. “Breakage and fractures are part of the chance and fate of human life, part of our personal history,” she says, "I embrace vulnerability and fragility. In truth that is how we reveal ourselves and really connect.” When Shashou has looked back on love that has disintegrated, and reflected on the times when she has felt ‘shattered’, she has realised that the pieces have rearranged themselves in a new harmonious order. “They fitted together but not they did before."

RESILIENCE

Sandra Shashou is proud to present Resilience, a new series of sculptures conceived in celebration of joy, integrity and balance, that continue to work through the complexities of vulnerability and fragility that were first articulated in her Broken series.

Confetti Carnival (10)

30 cm Diameter Plaque | Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Vintage Harlequin Porcelain | 2020 

It’s All Looking very Rosy (9)

30 cm Diameter Plaque | Royal Doulton and Royal Albert | Posy Vintage Porcelain Roses On Jesmonite and coated in resin | 2020

Balancing Act (8) 40 Width x 110 Height cm | Gold, Pink, White and Black Stacked Coffee Pots and Roses Gold Bondware Bavarian Fine Bone Porcelain Coffee Pots, Royal Albert Porcelain Roses Painted in Gold and Resin | 2019

 

Gold and Black (6) 35cm Diameter 45cm Height | Gold Bondware Bavarian Fine Bone Porcelain Coffee pots, Black Pigment in Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Old Country Rose (5) 25cm Diameter 30cm Height | Royal Albert Old Country Rose and Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain Teacups and Roses, White Stone Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Old Country Rose (4) 40cm Diameter 51cm Height | Royal Albert Old Country Rose and Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain Teacups and Roses, White Stone Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Yves Klein Blue (3) 40cm Diameter | Lomonosov and Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain, Blue Pigment in Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Pink (2) 26cm Diameter | Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain Teacups, Black Pigment in Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Gold and Silver (1) 36cm Diameter | Silver Royal Winton Fine Bone Porcelain Teapot, Gold Pigment on Jesmonite and Resin. | 2019

 

RESILIENCE

Sandra Shashou is proud to present Resilience, a new series of sculptures conceived in celebration of joy, integrity and balance, that continue to work through the complexities of vulnerability and fragility that were first articulated in her Broken series.

Confetti Carnival (10)

30 cm Diameter Plaque | Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Vintage Harlequin Porcelain | 2020 

It’s All Looking very Rosy (9)

30 cm Diameter Plaque | Royal Doulton and Royal Albert | Posy Vintage Porcelain Roses On Jesmonite and coated in resin | 2020

Balancing Act (8) 40 Width x 110 Height cm | Gold, Pink, White and Black Stacked Coffee Pots and Roses Gold Bondware Bavarian Fine Bone Porcelain Coffee Pots, Royal Albert Porcelain Roses Painted in Gold and Resin | 2019

 

Gold and Black (6) 35cm Diameter 45cm Height | Gold Bondware Bavarian Fine Bone Porcelain Coffee pots, Black Pigment in Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Old Country Rose (5) 25cm Diameter 30cm Height | Royal Albert Old Country Rose and Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain Teacups and Roses, White Stone Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Old Country Rose (4) 40cm Diameter 51cm Height | Royal Albert Old Country Rose and Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain Teacups and Roses, White Stone Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Yves Klein Blue (3) 40cm Diameter | Lomonosov and Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain, Blue Pigment in Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Pink (2) 26cm Diameter | Royal Stuart Spencer Stephenson Fine Bone Porcelain Teacups, Black Pigment in Jesmonite and Resin | 2019

 

Gold and Silver (1) 36cm Diameter | Silver Royal Winton Fine Bone Porcelain Teapot, Gold Pigment on Jesmonite and Resin. | 2019

 
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