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Lee Puffer

sculpture, installation, mixed media, ceramics

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November 4, 2018 | Lee

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Optimistic. It may not seem so, but there is an inherent optimism in the artist’s life. It’s a hopeful life. Art is the most uncertain of all career paths, to be sure. Despite the risk, or maybe because of it, we are a sanguine bunch. Defiantly so. There is optimism in defiance, I think. There’s such a feeling of hope in beginning a new artwork, series or project. Art materials themselves hold powerful potential. This project will be beautiful, transformative. Faith that the work will be amazing is what helps us persist and persevere. That said, it’s going to be an amazing semester! Don’t you think? #arteveryday #feelgood #befree #writingaboutart #dancingaboutarchetecture #icanhelpyou #beyou #makemeaning #makeitmeaningful #meaningmatters #makeart #artistlife #sculpture #artcurator #ceramicsculpture #contemporaryart #creativehappylife #creativelifehappylife #creativitycoach #porcelain #figurativeabstraction #artlife #markmaking #makeyourmark #smallworks #art-consultant #studiopractice #contemporaryceramics #leepuffer #abstractsculpture

This is a story about the origin of an image. (Part 1 of 3) I once worked in a ceramics lab as a teaching assistant. It was a large facility in a large art college. There were many teaching assistants and I was one of them. I worked with the evening students so I never really saw much of the other staff. There were these two young men that also worked in the lab, making glazes and firing kilns. I saw them occasionally, always together, I assumed they were friends. In the moments when we weren’t doing our lab duties, we were allowed to make our own work in ceramics. I made small sculpture. The two young men were potters, and prolific. They threw pots constantly and fired and glazed them and fired them again. Hundreds and hundreds of vases, jars, bowls, and cups. I don’t know what they did with all of them, but many of the pieces began to accumulate in the lab, on high shelves and windowsills, in corners and in closets, they were everywhere. Just pottery, nice and big and round in mostly earthy browns and greens. I would pick up the pieces and turn them over in my hands, looking at the foot. This is something ceramicists do. We do it so compulsively that at times we dump the contents of the pot on the table before we realize it was full, so strong is the urge to upturn a pot. #arteveryday #feelgood #befree #writingaboutart #dancingaboutarchetecture #icanhelpyou #beyou #makemeaning #makeitmeaningful #meaningmatters #makeart #artistlife #sculpture #artcurator #ceramicsculpture #contemporaryart #creativehappylife #creativelifehappylife #creativitycoach #porcelain #figurativeabstraction #artlife #markmaking #makeyourmark #smallworks #art-consultant #studiopractice #contemporaryceramics #leepuffer #abstractsculpture

(Part 2) On the pots that the young men made, every single foot was intricately decorated. When I discovered this I was stunned, tiny ornate drawings, carvings, line work, time consuming and precise, every one slightly different. On the foot. Unless you’re a ceramicist, you probably never look at the foot. So why would these guys make so many lovely, yet plain, pots and so intricately decorate the foot, over and over and over again? And just leave them everywhere? Eventually I asked someone what was going on. They are monks, I was told, and their practice is their devotion. The drawings on the foot of the pots were crosses, every single one a cross, executed in fine lines and details, each slightly different. The making and the decorating, the rhythm of the work itself, the service to the students and the school, all of it was a prayer. #arteveryday #feelgood #befree #writingaboutart #dancingaboutarchetecture #icanhelpyou #beyou #makemeaning #makeitmeaningful #meaningmatters #makeart #artistlife #sculpture #artcurator #ceramicsculpture #contemporaryart #creativehappylife #creativelifehappylife #creativitycoach #porcelain #figurativeabstraction #artlife #markmaking #makeyourmark #smallworks #art-consultant #studiopractice #contemporaryceramics #leepuffer #abstractsculpture

Upcoming Exhibits

Teaching

2018-2019

Southwestern College Ceramics 1. Monday/Wednesday 8:15am-11:30am http://www.swccd.edu

Grossmont College Ceramics 1. Tuesday/Thursday 9:30am -12:30 Ceramics 1. Tuesday/Thursday 1pm-4pm http://www.grossmont.edu

San Diego City College Figure Sculpture I, II, III Friday 9am-4pm

About Lee Puffer

Born in Long Beach, CA, Lee Puffer grew up in Coastal Massachusetts and Maine, Mexico, Venezuela, and the shores of Lake Erie in Western New York. Puffer began her career after graduating with Honors from the Massachusetts College of Art with a BFA from the Studio for Interrelated Media in 1992, working with Tony Oursler among others.
In 2004 Puffer enrolled in the Graduate program at San Diego State University, earning an MFA in 2007 with an emphasis of Ceramics. Her nomadic background manifests itself in sculpture made with a distinct sense of place. Her background as a multimedia artist lends her sculpture and sculptural installations immediacy and a contemporary sensibility.
Puffer creates life-sized figurative and kinetic sculpture and installation which offer cultural critique through personal and controversial imagery often appropriating and re-contextualizing images and ideas from popular culture.
She has exhibited at The Institute of Contemporary Art Boston, The American Museum of Ceramic Art, and The Women’s Museum of California among others. She is currently on faculty at Palomar College in San Marcos, California.

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