Meeting + interview with Marilyn Vince
Brutal. went to meet the ceramist Marilyn Vince in her studio in Issy. Let's discover his universe through an interview.
What is your background and your training to get to ceramics?
I do not come directly from ceramics. For me, it's a reconversion started twenty years ago. I studied languages (translation-interpreting) and commerce in France, Switzerland and Italy. I then worked for several years between Paris and New York in the field of language exchanges, translation and interpreting, and in international real estate.
Are you self-taught or did you learn from someone else?
On my return from New York in 1998 I felt the need to do things with my hands, I was very into the brain and the exchanges with the outside world and I needed to refocus myself more. It was during this period that I started taking modeling and filming lessons in Montreuil with Valeria Polsinelli.Then passion took over and I started a filmmaking CAP training with master turner Augusto Tozzola. This meeting was decisive and allowed me to leave my job and set up on my own a few years later.
Do you remember your first play?
I had done modeling in a MJC when I was a teenager and I remember very well the piece that I had kept: it was surprisingly, and I cannot explain it: a blue chamber pot from Sèvres...I remember later in leisure class the first piece that I finalized and was able to recover: I still have it in the workshop. It is a turned, engobed and enameled red earthenware bowl: a game of matte black and very colorful shiny enamel very fifty in spirit.
How would you define your job?
My work has evolved a lot over the years.I started with a work of unique pieces, close to the sandstone sculpture of Iraq: these are pieces that still characterize my work today because they touch on something essential for me which is the duality between force and fragility: the raw side of this chamotte clay pushed to extreme fragility interests me a lot. Simple, clean geometric or organic shapes are also important.In recent years I have been working more on small series of utilitarian pieces in mass-tinted porcelain: finesse and purity and design are a continuous thread that connects these 2 periods.
What is your creative and manufacturing process?
In my creative process there are two stages: drawing and shaping.I always start by drawing, then comes the step of coloring on paper, then that of prototyping which can be more or less long: this is the moment when I have to calibrate my object as well as possible so that it corresponds to the better than the initial idea.Finally, I put in production. I only work on unique pieces or very small limited series.
What is your favorite technique? Your favorite moment in the process?
My favorite technique remains filming: the sensations are strong, the technique very present and it is important in my opinion.My favorite moment in the process is the turning or the modeling finishes: I like the moment when you can spend hours on the detail and see the shape come closer and closer to the initial idea.
What is your favorite material? What do you like about him?
I like all clays, but there are two that I particularly like: perhaps because they represent opposites in a way: it's sandstone from Iraq and porcelain.I like the chamotte of sandstone and its raw appearance, its sound which changes as the turning stages go by and I like porcelain for its great softness and its indomitable side: you never know what it is. book as a surprise! I am currently working on a new collection that would combine the 2.
What inspires you outside of ceramics?
Like many ceramists, I am inspired by nature, but I am also passionate about architecture, design and materials in general. But the asphalt of a Parisian sidewalk or the color of a sky can also inspire me.
Can you tell us about one or more books on ceramics or something else?
A very beautiful book that one of my students gave me last year: The praise of the shadow of Junichuro Tanizaki which remains a reference in what Japan has to bring us as Westerners on the notions of aestheticism. About a ceramist by René Ben Lisa that I read when I started and which for me represents a lesson in life and humility for all ceramists, and all of Michel Pastoureau's books on color.
What are your last significant trips or your travel desires?
The last significant trip dates back to last year: traveling all over Scotland in a Campervan with the family for a month.I would also very much like to return to Africa, which remains for me a continent of wonder and permanent inspiration .
