Ted Adler

My work inhabits the space between the tangible materiality of clay and the abstraction of the vessel as an idea. Forms emerge through a process of adding, stretching, and pinching clay, sometimes on the potter’s wheel, often by hand, allowing each piece to evolve organically rather than conform to a predetermined design. Every gesture invites a response from the material, embedding intention in each touch while guiding the next movement. The vessel, then, is not a fixed destination but the outcome of an open-ended inquiry, a record of reciprocal exchange between maker and material. I am drawn to clay both as material and as metaphor. Its plasticity and capacity for transformation allow me to emphasize a sense of “made-ness,” while the sensuous, fluid volumes of the vessel invite associations with the body, memory, and lived experience. Wood-firing extends this dialogue; the kiln’s shifting atmosphere producing richly varied surfaces that register flux, chance, and change, echoing clay’s protean nature. Subjecting the vessel to these processes of forming and firing lends it a sense of transformation that is at once literal and symbolic. In this way, the work operates as an analogy for selfhood, holding together the dynamic interplay of internal and external experience.

Ted Adler (b. 1969, San Juan, Puerto Rico) is a ceramic artist and Professor of Art at Wichita State University. His practice focuses on the materiality and cultural significance of the ceramic vessel, examining its role in both contemporary and historical contexts. Adler studied with Toshiko Takaezu from 1993-94 and received his MFA in Studio Art from Ohio University in 2002. He has exhibited his works in over 125 exhibitions across the United States and abroad. Adler has been invited to share his practice through lectures and workshops at noted venues like Anderson Ranch Arts Center and the Archie Bray Foundation, as well as universities and art centers around the country. He lives and works in Wichita, Kansas.