Maxime Jean Lefebvre
My current series of vessels visually depicts my observations in American supermarkets, which have always felt like museums to me. In this work I create objects of an imagined future “past.” Clay is ageless and constitutes much of what we know of past civilizations, making ceramics the natural medium of choice for this project. The plastic containers that inspire these forms will, in turn, be how our history will be deciphered by future generations.
I have been applying diferent patterns and textures to the vessels, as a way to highlight the shape and erase the brand, so that they would remain familiar but become slightly uncanny. I picture a historian, in a very distant future, looking at both roman amphoras and detergent bottles, trying to connect the functions of the two, bridging the immense gap between elegant terra cotta bearing prized olive oil and plastic filled with toxic chemicals. The result is a new kind of vessel, reminiscent of the shape of an amphora, but ever so gaudy and mismatched.
The latest evolution of this project are milk amphoras which bear patterns used in the military and for hunting, featuring vivid colors that defeat their very purpose. The blank space where the label should be will soon be filled with tragic images of the Civil War. I want them to become an antithesis to war representation in Greek amphoras. In lieu of heroism and masculinity, they display the stillness and sadness of young men laying dead in a field, alone and graveless.
Maxime Jean Lefebvre was born and raised in France. He started experimenting with ceramics early on, and was brought to a lot of history museums as a youngster. After graduating from the École Nationale Supérieure d’Art de Bourges, he moved to America to pursue his MFA in Printmaking at Rhode Island School of Design. Maxime is inspired by systems of power and his experience as a foreigner in America. Through his current body of ceramic work, he is exploring relationships between commerce, history and the everyday familiar. He is currently a resident in ceramics at the Steel Yard in Providence.
