Jesse Small Art

Small’s work includes porcelain figurines and lace-like steel chandeliers inspired by branches and twigs he has documented during his travels. While in China, Small’s porcelain forms...

Small’s work includes porcelain figurines and lace-like steel chandeliers inspired by branches and twigs he has documented during his travels. While in China, Small’s porcelain forms...

Small’s work includes porcelain figurines and lace-like steel chandeliers inspired by branches and twigs he has documented during his travels. While in China, Small’s porcelain forms...

Small’s work includes porcelain figurines and lace-like steel chandeliers inspired by branches and twigs he has documented during his travels. While in China, Small’s porcelain forms...

Small’s work includes porcelain figurines and lace-like steel chandeliers inspired by branches and twigs he has documented during his travels. While in China, Small’s porcelain forms developed as visual communicators, in a culture where he didn’t speak the language. Like tattoos, Small’s glaze imagery of colorful Chinese trucks, buses, traditional motifs, nature and ornament float on the skin of his two primary porcelain forms, Talk Bubbles and Ghosts. Small’s steel chandeliers contain echoes of the opulent past of the 17th & 18th century, but have been set free of function and the restraint of tradition. Constructed of filigreed steel cut by computer controlled machines, the chandeliers are composed of “fins” of metal lace, hinged around a central axis. Small’s chandeliers are suspended sculptures that question the origins of ornamental habits. Major stylistic revolutions such as Bauhaus or Pop demolish definitions and use of ornament, but many old habits slip through the cracks. Contemporary Porcelain Sculpture with Intricate Ceramic Decals, Colorful Pattern