Joanne Kirkland and Maggie Jaszczak

The Nature of Things

January 10 - February 23, 2025

Abel Contemporary is excited to present the work of ceramic artists, Joanne Kirkland and Maggie Jaszczak. This first show of our 2025 season brings together two artists who explore the essence of the world around us through clay. 

Jaszczak approaches ceramics through hand-worked surfaces that emphasize the subtleties of material, process and firing as the primary decorative elements – dragged grog, finger marks, the layering of slips and terra sigillata, and the rough whites and blacks that come from reduction firing. 

Kirkland's most recent work explores the night sky and her continued exploration of pattern. These pieces are primarily made on the wheel with porcelain clay, sometimes altered by paddling, stretching or adding slabs.  She likes the dynamic surface decoration with figurative and abstract imagery inspired by the elements and environment of her daily life.  

Celestial

January 10 - February 23, 2024

This show will portray the beauty of the night sky and places beyond our earthly plane to contemplate the profound mysteries held by the sun, moon, planets, and stars. The exhibition will include artists working in various media exploring the beauty of the cosmos and contemplating a deeper reflection of our place within it. Theresa Abel, Randall Berndt, Barry Roal Carlsen, Holly Cohn, Kelly Connole, Mary Fischer, Mary Hood, Richard Jones, William Lemke, John S. Miller, Dennis Nechvatal, Ann Orlowski, Adam Stoner, and Jonathan Wilde

no. 5: Glacial Bodies by Carolyn Spears

January 10 - February 23, 2024

In September of 2023, Spears traveled across Iceland to experience glacial sites as part of her ongoing research into ice and climate change. The works in this show counterbalance the geography of Wisconsin’s past-glaciated landscape with Iceland’s active glaciation, a place critically vulnerable to global warming.

Artist Talk with Carolyn Spears

Saturday, February 8, 2PM