Doris Kapner
Website: doriskapner.com
Twitter: @DorisKapner
Instagram: @doriskapner
Artist: Doris Kapner
Email: doriskapner@gmail.com
ABOUT: Doris Kapner is a Davidson-based sculptor whose work focuses on gender issues, especially the objectification of women. She is an Arts & Science Council (ASC) 2020 Community Supported Art artist and recently received an ASC Regional Artist Project Grant.
“The objects I’m currently exploring in ceramics are undergarments, handkerchiefs and dresses,” she writes in an artist’s statement. “They work as portraits with no face, as much every woman as any woman since to me they are layered in meaning, as symbols of both objectification and power, personal and impersonal. Women have mixed feelings about exposing their undergarments from empowerment to shame, something we are aware of but generally hide from the world. Undergarments are a symbol that we've used to reclaim our power, from bra burning to underwear selfies looking for validation ranging from being sexy to being real. Handkerchiefs have a history as a woman’s object, used as a token of love, to convey secret messages, part of dowries, and with the dawn of screen printing, even as propaganda. Dresses convey beauty, status, and expression. So much meaning is tied to what we wear and what we own. Creating these traditional textiles in ceramic references the domesticity of the medium, and women’s place while the forms have replaced the body or the woman as the subject.”
MEDIA COVERAGE
Feminine Ceramics By Doris Kapner - Create Magazine
