John Mason New Work
June 1 - July 2, 2004
John Mason's most recent sculptures which he aptly refers to as "Trans-Orbs", are composed of intersecting slab formed planes cut from circular slabs. The shapes of these orbs are reinforced by their curved slab edges which serve to visually "contain" the straight edged imagery glazed on the slab walls.
The cross or "x" image which permeated much of Mason's works from the late 1950's through the 1960's has pointedly re-emerged in these new works in the form of detailed glazed reliefs or "tracers". Set on the interior planes of the slab sections, these lines and their subtle, softly rendered edges intersect and alter at each viewing angle to create continuously changing rectilinear shapes that play off the orbicular architecture of the whole object.
The "torquing" appearance of these rectilinear "images" (i.e. prisms, crosses, parallelograms, etc...) while viewing these works in the round is at the heart of how this artist addresses issues of perspective. Scale, proximity and density of these objects alter and, to a certain extent, become ambiguous within the viewing process.
Mason began creating these works with computer sketches that were enhanced by an architectural drafting program with which he was able to predetermine the placement of circular segments and "tracer" glaze lines. He then created paper maquettes which were the final predetermining step before the assembling of pressed semidry clay slab segments. The precise application of glaze on and around the partially masked object becomes in effect a perspectival drawing within a three dimensional space.