Artist: Breana Ferreira
Breana Ferreira, CALIFORNIA
BIO
Breana Ferreira (she/her) was born and raised in Southern California and received her BFA in Ceramics in the Spring of 2022 from the University of North Texas. Her practice integrates clay with a variety of 2-dimensional art practices to capture the natural and industrial aspects of everyday life. Her pots exist as vessels for personal narrative that contribute to the tradition of the pot as a container for culture, for communication, and for the kitchen. Breana is currently an emerging studio artist working with clay in association with the American Museum of Ceramic Art in Pomona, CA as a long-term artist in residence until September of 2023.
Artist Statement
My practice revolves around a personal preoccupation with the daily discoveries and melancholy mundanities of my own everyday life. I look to the past and the present at the curated spaces and faces called home, the ornamentation of a building or a body, and even the makeshift maintenance of an object or a community. Through this daily practice of active observation, I collect and draw from personal and cultural familiarity. I look internally and externally in this way with a focus on the discovery and rediscovery of self, space, and society.
I utilize functional ceramics as fitting vehicles for the recognition and documentation of these daily observations. I choose a clay canvas for its color, its pliability, and its tactility. I choose clay for its history, its culture, and its community. I choose clay because in a symbolic and almost magical way, it becomes something that walks the same line we do between resilience and fragility. My practice plays with the integration of clay and all of its symbolism with a variety of 2-dimensional art practices. I am particularly intrigued by how this integration of material, practice, and perspective captures both the natural and industrial aspects of everyday life in all of its forms, colors, textures, and spirit.
Through this act of preserving what I recognize as the present moment into objects that embody my own common day chaos, I am crafting extensions of myself and assigning each object and its subject matter a sense of personal value and permanence. In this way, I think I try to craft a kind of poetry into my pots. A poetry that speaks about learning to maneuver within the embedded beliefs and practices of a childhood and a culture; How both breed a yearning for awareness, understanding, and balance. Or maybe more so a simpler kind of poetry that speaks solely about the daily attempts at positivity and perseverance in the presence of intrusive thought. Whether you look at my work and see an aesthetically pleasing object or this tangled poetry within it, my pots exist to me as vessels for personal narrative that become a contemporary contribution to a tradition of the pot as a container for culture, for communication, and for the kitchen.
Education
2022
BFA, Studio Art, Ceramics; University of North Texas, Denton, TX, 2022
Residencies
2022-2023
Long-term Resident Artist at the American Museum of Ceramic Art, September 2022 - September 2023, Pomona, CA
2021-2022
Work Exchange Resident Artist with Brooks Oliver, December 2021 - August 2022, Denton, TX
Exhibitions
2023
2023 Annual Yunomi Invitational , Invitational cup show, July 2023 , Clay AKAR, Iowa City, IA TBD, Invitational group feature, July 14 - TBD , Signature Contemporary Craft Gallery, Atlanta, GA
Drawn to the Surface, Invitational group exhibition, June 9 - July 8, Carbondale Clay Center, Carbondale, CO
Dallas Pottery Invitational, Invitational group show, April 14-16, Dallas, TX
Above Board 3rd Annual Online Tableware Exhibition, Invitational group feature, March 12-18, Above Board Ceramics, WWW
2022
What A Cup Knows, Invitational cup show, The Artstream Nomadic Gallery, WWW Graduating Solo Show, May 21, Kendall Davis Clay, Fort Worth, TX
Say Something: Tactile Voices in Clay, 3rd Annual National Juried Exhibition, April 30 - June 11, Saratoga Clay Arts Center, Schacht Gallery, Schuylerville, NY
Cups for Y’all, Invitational group feature, March 12, Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, Asher Gallery, Houston, TX
Mug Madness ‘22, Juried cup show, Saltstone Ceramics, WWW
2021
ICAN 2nd Annual Holiday Cup Show, Juried cup show, November 11 - January 7, online gallery.
29th Strictly Functional Pottery National, Juried exhibition, September 25 - November 13, Lancaster Museum of Art, PA
CAMEO Emerging Artist Show, Juried exhibition, August 30 - September 24, College of Mainland, Texas City, TX
2019
Urban Landscape, Ceramic senior group showcase, CVAD Art Building, University of North Texas, Denton, TX
UNT CVAD Ceramic Student Showcase, CVAD Art Building display cases, University of North Texas, Denton, TX
Grants, Awards, Honors, and Features
2021
ICAN 2nd Annual Holiday Cup Show finalist winner.
https://ceramicartsnetwork.org/Contests/ICANOnlineExhibition/ICAN-Online-Juried-Show-Exhibition-Arc hives-198456/2nd-annual-ican-cup-show-gallery
29th Strictly Functional Pottery National pictured artist featured in the SFPN show exposure spread in the November 2021 edition of the Ceramics Monthly magazine.
https://ceramicartsnetwork.org/ceramics-monthly/ceramics-monthly-article/exposure-november-2021
Clay Crits featured artist during the month of May.
https://www.instagram.com/p/COVjmiNhLIi/
Virtual NCECA Skutt Student Competition grand prize winner.
https://skutt.com/featured/events/nceca-21/
2020
NCECA Skutt Student Competition grand prize winner.
https://skutt.com/2020-student-competition-entries/
Related Work Experience
Adult & Teen Throwing , Handbuilding, and Surface Instructor, September 2022 - September 2023, The American Museum of Ceramic Art, Pomona, CA
Throwing & Handbuilding Instructor, January 2022 - July 2022, Kendall Davis Clay, Fort Worth, TX Studio Manager & Production Assistant, August 2019 - July 2022, Kendall Davis Clay, Fort Worth, TX UNT Clay Guild Secretary, August 2021 - December 2021, University of North TX, Denton, TX UNT Studio Technician Assistant, January 2019 - May 2021, University of North TX, Denton, TX
UNT Clay Guild Treasurer, January 2020 - May 2021, University of North TX, Denton, TX
Creator & Coordinator ofthe Aura Pottery Pop Up, December 2019, UNT undergraduate & graduate ceramic student art sale, Aura Coffee,
Denton, TX