Scott Elk
Desire Lines - Spectrum Vase, 2022.
Stoneware ceramic, gold lustre
45cm x 45cm x 48cm

This artwork was inspired by my system of clay and glaze tests I made for the Desire Lines series. Each mountain spike I documented which was referenced back to documentation allowing me to remake a particular glaze, or to provide a reference point for further exploration. Here I wanted to turn those tests into its own formal, stand-alone artwork. I played with the placement of spikes, emerging from the base as the viewer moves around the piece.

DETAIL:

Desire Lines

The majority of work produced in 2022 falls into my Desire Lines series of paintings, drawings, screenprints, and ceramics. The series is about relationship to place, connection to people, and the sometimes intoxicating, head-fucking connection of physical interaction.

A desire line, is a term often referred to in urban or transportation planning, as a path created as a consequence of human traffic. The path usually represents the shortest or most easily navigated route between an origin and destination. It is the way taken by choice, by desire, and by necessity when following the heart. It is movement with intention.

In a real world practical application, the desire lines have the possibility to connect people resulting in events along a time line. I see people as these spinning vortexes of energy, in a positive sense like galaxies spinning and reaching out, and in contrast, negatively sucking everything towards themselves like black holes spinning. When two of these things collide, wondrous and unexpected things can happen; colours swirl, planets could be flung out of orbit, or set in a new orbit, momentarily or until the end of time. My interpretation of these desire lines is constantly searching to insert the human element of connection into fragmented, and abstracted forms.