Collections
| Back New Search Tips |
Sperry, Robert
| Last Name: | Sperry |
|---|---|
| First Name: | Robert |
| Dates: |
1927 (Date of Birth)
2008 (Date of Death)
|
| Biography/History: | Robert Sperry was born in 1927 in Bushnell, IL and he passed away in 1998 in Seattle, WA after a long struggle with bone cancer. He grew up in Saskatchawan on a farm. He joined the US Army at 18 and took his first art lessons while stationed in West Germany. In 1950, He graduated with a BA from the University of Saskatchawan, receiving his BFA in Painting from the Art Institute of Chicago in 1953. After spending a summer at the Archie Bray Foundation he received his MFA in Ceramics at University of Washington in 1955. Between 1955 and 1982 he taught Ceramics at the University of Washington; during that time Sperry, Patty Warashina, and Howard Kottler created a ceramics department at the University of Washington that captured National attention. In 1976, Sperry and fellow Professor of Ceramics at the University of Washington, Patti Warashina married. Sperry was a productive artist – in clay as a potter and sculptor, as a filmmaker, a muralist, and a printmaker. During a trip to Onda, Japan – He created the film The Village Potters of Onda, in 1963, and in 1967 he produced an award winning film entitled Profiles Cast Long Shadows. In the 1960’s two contrasting concerns run through most of Sperry’s works: fast tempo with effortless brushwork, uninhibited expressive qualities; and his sometimes spent hours of painstakingly decorating the surfaces of his works. He was heavily influenced by the aesthetics of Japanese folk ceramics. Sperry is best known for his pioneering use of a heavy slip layer over glaze, producing a decorative ceramic motif not unlike a parched and cracked lakebed. |
| Related Objects: |
4234.31 (Sculpture, Untitled #328, 1979)
4234.32 (Sculpture, Slab Plate #386 (23), 1989)
4234.33 (Sculpture, Plate #984, 1989)
|