Art
www.qns.com i LIC COURIER i FEBRuary 2017 49
Ellen Day
A New Year message of “May you
turn your can’ts into canisters and your
plans into planters” greeted me as I
entered the BrickHouse Ceramic Art
Center in Long Island City. Ellen Day’s
ceramic sanctuary, which she founded
in 2007, is an integral part of the LIC
arts community. She works out of this
studio, and BrickHouse also offers
classes.
“Many artists from the community
take classes or rent space here,” Day
said. “BrickHouse supports collaborative
programs and is well established
in the New York City ceramic art community.”
On a tour of the fully equipped facilities,
I got to see a potter wheel
in action along with a wide array of
glazes, kilns and recycled clay slabs
all at the ready. I lingered at the gift
shop, which includes one-of-a-kind
pieces made by Day and other ceramic
artists from the studio.
Day first learned ceramics at Springfield
Gardens High School in Queens.
There, her work was shown in a citywide
student show at Lever House.
“That was my first exhibit, and I was
hooked,” she said.
Day’s own work combines the more
functional with special sculptural angular
pieces that explore her own
self-discovery as an African-American
woman. Day is a member of Long Island
City Artists and participates in LIC Arts
Open. A well-established artist, Day has
shown both in the United States and
internationally.
After a successful holiday sale, Day
and BrickHouse’s next big event is a
hunger relief event called LIC Empty
Bowls. The Manducatis Rustica restaurant
will host the LIC Empty Bowls event
on Wednesday, March 8, from 5 to 8
p.m. at 46-33 Vernon Blvd. In exchange
for a $25 donation, all are invited to
share a simple meal (donated by the
restaurant) and take home a beautiful
handmade bowl created by local artists
from BrickHouse. A national organization
raising awareness for hunger,
Empty Bowls, working in conjunction
with Here’s Life Inner City’s March event,
will raise money toward supporting 25
inner-city, church-based soup kitchens
and food pantries with food, toiletries
and household products for those in
need. The empty bowl you leave with is
intended to serve as a reminder of all the
hunger and empty bowls in the world.
brickhouseny.com
Photos courtesy of Ellen Day
Lori Klopp
Graphic designer, illustrator and
painter Lori Klopp describes her work
as “narrative, editorial, often irreverent
and satirical.” Her bold and colorful
style also connotes a thinking person’s
approach to the ridiculousness of the
world, in the way a New Yorker cover
or old issue of Mad Magazine might.
When pressed about any influence
the creators of Alfred E. Neuman might
have had in her work, Klopp responded,
“I have to confess that I did read Mad
Magazine as a kid. So yes, it probably
wormed its way into my head to do
permanent damage. Whenever I do a
portrait, I just try to capture the personality
of the subject.”
For examples of this, one just has to
explore Klopp’s Pinup Parody Series,
which takes the absurdity of the depiction
of women in American illustration
throughout the years and turns it on
its head.
“After studying the images of women
made by men over the decades, I became
fascinated by the absurdity of
many of them — particularly the pinups
from the mid-20th century. I kept wondering
what would happen if someone
did the same thing with men. How would
people react? We are used to seeing
women portrayed as stupid sex kittens,
but what about men? So I decided I
had to do it. It started with one painting,
inspired by the calendar illustrator
Gil Elvgren. I have been surprised by
the range of reactions to the series. To
me, it’s obviously satire — a feminist
statement. But every once in a while,
someone will interpret them literally,
and that kind of freaks me out.”
Her larger-than-life portraits of
Monica Lewinsky and Hillary Clinton
are wonderfully bizarre in the lightness
and celebration that they portray.
“With Hillary, I was celebrating her
big personality, her ambition and drive,
things we usually admire in men, but, as
we have recently seen, not so much in
women,” Klopp said. “Some people think
that since it’s not flattering and pretty
(whatever that is), that means I don’t
like Hillary. I actually do like her, and I
voted for her. And I think she would have
made a good president. But my purpose
in doing the portrait was to capture her
attitude. By the way, I painted that in
early 2013, way before she announced
she was running.”
The current political climate has affected
Klopp’s work and left her with
new goals.
“So far, I have done a small portrait
of Myron Ebell, a climate change denier
who led Trump’s EPA transition. Now I’ll
have to do Scott Pruitt if he’s confirmed
by Congress. If this election has had any
positive effect, it is that people like me
who have been going along la-de-da
these past 8 years will get our asses
in gear and start raising hell. Nothing
like a repressive dictator to motivate us
lazy artists! For me, I see an emerging
mission to educate. Not sure how to
accomplish that, but it’s a goal.”
Klopp is an Astoria-based artist who
uses Astoria Park to keep her sane.
“I walk and jog there several times
each week,” she said. “I love the view
across the river of Manhattan at sunset.
It’s got to be one of the best peoplewatching
places in the world, especially
on Sunday afternoons when entire families
go down there. Old men and their
show cars, young guys on their trickedout
bikes, grandparents and babies, teenagers
perched on the railing. I also love
that I have neighbors and friends from
other countries and cultures. There’s
definitely an odd, contradictory combination
of things here: bleakly utilitarian and
garishly ornate, international yet naive
and provincial. Queens is like the South
in that respect, loaded with nonsensical
contradictions. Perhaps that’s why I feel
comfortable here.”
loriklopp.com
