ANNIE CAMPBELL

My work examines disconnections between humans and nature in the Anthropocene and society’s artificial constructs that allow us to perceive ourselves as separate from nature. Using clay, organic materials, and mixed sculpture media, I have developed a visual vocabulary that speaks to environmental disasters and expresses our collective fragility in the face of climate change.

In 2017 my infant son was diagnosed with a rare neurological condition that caused catastrophic epilepsy. The only treatment for this life-threatening condition was a complete surgical disconnection of the two hemispheres of his brain. This traumatic experience was the catalyst for the injection of neurology into my work. What I learned while researching neuronal pathways, seizures, neuroplasticity, and different types of brain cells resonated with my long-held passion for exploring the human/nature disconnect. Additionally, my son’s surgical incision led me to explore stitching as a visual metaphor. I stitch with silk suture thread, steel wire, conductive thread, and rusted wire to symbolize a repetitive, reparative act in the midst of feeling helpless when faced with overwhelming danger. The neuronal forms, which are malformed, damaged and deteriorating, symbolize society’s dysfunctional relationship with nature. The light patterns from LED lights inserted into translucent porcelain forms represent seizure activity in the brain. Their dangerous and damaging irregular misfirings are representative of the collective cognitive dissonance perpetuated by humanity as it continually harms our natural world in ways that will lead to its inevitable destruction.

Plant structures mimic our circulatory and respiratory systems. The miles of “information super-highway” that exist amongst tree roots in the form of mycelium fungal networks operate similarly to neuronal synaptic systems. By dipping botanical elements into liquid porcelain and firing out the organic material, the resulting hollow structures are akin to eggshells, bones, and fossils. The extreme fragility of these forms conceptually links the work to our precarious position in time. Without significant public policy change, in less than 20 years, we will reach the “point of no return” regarding carbon emissions. The work is successful when viewers come away with a heightened sense of the precipice upon which we waver. To consider ourselves separate from the biosphere we inhabit is a tenuous fallacy perpetuated by those who stand to profit from this collective delusion.

To direct my practice, I ask myself if this work is an act of visual persuasion or protest; to what extent am I interested in affecting my audience’s opinions and beliefs on the climate crisis? Or is it self-expression in the form of synthesizing terrifying statistics into objects of beauty as a psychological survival mechanism? The answer is that the work is simultaneously didactic and cathartic. It is in dialogue with the ongoing societal discourse around environmental destruction, and it is designed to inspire self-reflection and a realization of personal responsibility.

Annie B Campbell is a neurodivergent ceramic and multi-media sculptor and Associate Professor of Art in the Department of Art & Art History at Auburn University. She resides in Opelika, Alabama with her disabled 6-year-old 1 year old sons and artist/musician husband. At Auburn she teaches all levels of hand-built and wheel-thrown ceramics. She received her Bachelor of Fine Art from the Department of Crafts and Material Studies at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2004, with a ceramics concentration. She received her Master of Fine Art in Studio Ceramics from Indiana University, Bloomington in May 2010. She has completed artist’s residencies at Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts in Maine, The Scottish Sculpture Workshop, UK, Studio 550 in New Hampshire, and Hambidge Center for the Creative Arts and Sciences in Georgia. In 2019 she was awarded a research grant and teaching release from Auburn, during which she completed a 4-month residency at the Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop in Scotland, culminating in a solo exhibition. It was there that she embarked on her current body of work inspired by neuroscience and environmental degradation. She maintains an active studio practice and continues to exhibit her sculpture and installations nationally and internationally.