Brooke Hine @ 915 Spring Garden Studios
Brooke Hine‘s studio at 915 Spring Garden Studios is a mess, 7 years of animistic ceramic sculpture parts piled high in corners, alien skeletons hanging from the ceiling, shiny blobs of ceramics with fluttering cat whiskers cling precariously to a shelf, wiggly tentacles are poking through the wall, plates & bowls are stacked everywhere like a Mad Hatter Tea Party and a trove of ceramic jewelry hangs haphazardly from the lip of a mug spilling onto a custom plate. Signs of creativity are everywhere, there seems to be a million things going, the nature of her medium is to be continually working on new work because of the hurry up and wait process, but Brooke knows exactly what she’s doing. Her bangs are cut too short but she’s fit & tan from playing Ultimate Frisbee, the recent alumni of the Center for Emerging Visual Arts Fellowship program is narrowing her art production focus incorporating a bit of her unique surrealism into objects for everyday life. She still is pursuing gallery shows, site specific installations of her iconic ceramics and curating for galleries but she really likes seeing her work used in a more functional way, spotting a necklace on a lady on the street or selling one of a kind plates to someone who will look at them every day makes her feel good.
Jewelry is a new direction for her, the amulets look like they’re from part of a larger sculpture, you would expect them to be fragile but they become very durable after firing. The natural shapes and neutral tones are simple yet sophisticated like her sculptures, strange and compelling textures and silhouettes. Using image transfer decals, Brooke is re-purposing large plates and bowls she acquired from the old Philadelphia Hotel with her signature fluid designs. Hines says the designing of decals in Illustrator and having them produced for transfer to ceramics is addictive, allowing her to micro mass produce utilitarian objects infused with her amorphous design sensibility. She’s setting up an eCommerce page on her web-site, forgoing the popular on-line arts sites in favor of her own digital store front. Once again this Fall her studio will be part of the Philadelphia Open Studio Tours (915 is not usually open to the public) offering a chance to see her workspace and art showcase. Brooke exhibited work at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts as part of the Summer Solstice promotional event for POST and is an outspoken proponent for the value of the grass roots arts event. She finds the resources, exposure and promotion POST & CFEVA offers to be invaluable. 915 Spring Garden Art Studios was an early precursor to the now city-wide open studio art event and the five levels of studios are enough to keep you occupied for hours without leaving the building. Hine’s is thinking of selling off pieces of one of her larger sculptures like the one that was installed at Urban Outfitters headquarters at the Navy Yard, each element is a sculpture in it’s own right anyway so why not let people have part if not the whole. Maybe by October Brooke HIne’s studio will be ready for crowds with room to move around, but for now the space is hoarded with ideas.
Brooke Hine @ 915 Spring Garden Studios
Brooke Hine @ 915 Spring Garden Studios
Brooke Hine @ 915 Spring Garden Art Studios
DoN Brewer, SideArts Contributing Writer
Photos by DoN Brewer
