Irja Bodén
My practice invokes memory. My recent work, The Stacks, echoes the impressive collection of awards my father won as a competitive marksman when I was a child in northern Sweden. Though I’ve lived in the US for many years, looking back comes naturally and, at times, comes unbidden. Arranging my hollow ceramic forms into trophy-stacks is to suggest something familiar yet abstract, and I practice my ceramics upon functional and familiar forms that have been altered into abstract sculptures.
Each work within The Stacks is made in series of three to eighteen pieces, is between five and twenty-four inches tall, with variances in color, texture and form. I lightly secure the stacking components, though I sometimes leave pieces unattached to articulate that balance implies precariousness. The separate groupings tell a unique narrative of relationship, balance, and scale.
Irja Bodén works in many media; ceramics are at the core of her work. Irja grew up north of the Arctic Circle in Sweden, and received her BFA with honors from the State University of New York of Potsdam. Her work has been exhibited in New York state and abroad. She is a recipient of several residencies and grants, to include ones from the New York State Council on the Arts and the Vermont Studio Center. Currently she lives and works in New York’s Hudson Valley.