Rice Wine and Rain Clouds
Jordan Gower
3 May 2024
Rice Wine and Rain Clouds is Jordan Gower’s first solo exhibition of ceramics.
With a focus on wheel throwing, Gower’s ceramic practice reflects a worldview that places importance on material and process. His forms explore clay and glaze chemistry in a style broadly influenced by European studio pottery, Chinese Song Dynasty wares and Japanese naturalism; highlighting craft objects as viable and meaningful contemporary expressions.
The title Rice Wine and Rain Clouds may conjure images of nature and observation, of taking time to notice and meditating on our place within the world. However, for Gower these objects, although being made of nature, inherently reflect the city. They take on the character of their surrounding conditions, where space, surface and line intersect as passing views in time.
Often Gower’s work includes bowls as a recurring motif; a vessel form with an expression that emphasises negative space, where emptiness becomes as tangible and positive as a physical object. This motif drives the material exploration, grounding his practice in tradition, yet in no way limiting the outcomes.
Ultimately the exhibition aims to present objects that encourage us to pay careful attention – ceramics that hold still our attention – and suspend our sense of material consumption as we move throughout a world of apparent limitlessness.
This project is proudly supported by the Government of South Australia and Forage Supply Co.
