Bella Blanca (b. 2001, Portland OR) is a Chilean-American ceramic artist, educator, and emerging human based on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səlilwətaɬ nations. She is currently working towards a BFA in Critical and Cultural Practices at Emily Carr University of Art + Design. Blanca uses ceramic sculpture as a means of understanding how craft informs and reflects individual and cultural identities. She views the material process as a conduit for devotion, care, and love. Blanca lives in East Vancouver and teaches at Mudlab Pottery. Her work has been exhibited in Vancouver and Victoria B.C. In 2024, she received the Gardiner Museum Emerging Artist Award.
Artist Statements:
In my practice I employ and alter traditional methods of wheel-throwing, hand-building and glazing. By deviating from the norms of making I’m able to explore the animate qualities of clay, and create works which depict a tactile conversation between myself and the material. This process has created a space to express my experience as a woman of mixed ethnic and cultural identity through the use of visual metaphor.
My ongoing series of works entitled “Face Pots'' explores narrative and selfhood through personification of vessel forms. Each piece is improvised, allowing me to form a material partnership by way of intuitive building. I create vessels with a gentle yet commanding presence in a variety of scales, articulating my sensorial fascination with clay through texture created by pinching coils together. I allow the atmospheric firing process to dictate the end result. With this body of work I investigate the idea of coming into being, and all the ambiguity that comes with it.