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Sergei Isupov’s Surreal Sculptures Span Dimensions

Sergei Isupov’s figurative porcelain and stoneware sculptures use the material in differing ways. The artist sometimes uses the surface to create 2D renderings, and elsewhere, the characters are three-dimensional. More recently, some of the works do both on the same piece.

Sergei Isupov’s figurative porcelain and stoneware sculptures use the material in differing ways. The artist sometimes uses the surface to create 2D renderings, and elsewhere, the characters are three-dimensional. More recently, some of the works do both on the same piece.

The show Sergei Isupov: Hidden Messages runs at Erie Art Museum in Pennsylvania through April 2. The show offers a career survey for the artist, spanning 20 years. Included in that collection are recent larger-than-life and smaller works. “Exquisitely painted with Isupov’s peculiar and fascinating imagery, the work is created with traditional slab-building techniques, pushing ceramic material to its limits,” the museum says

“Working instinctually and using my observations, I create a new, intimate universe that reveals the relationships, connections and contradictions as I perceive them,” Isupov says, in a statement. “I find clay to be the most versatile material and it is well suited to the expression of my ideas. I consider my sculptures to be a canvas for my paintings. All the plastic, graphic and painting elements of a piece function as complementary parts of the work.”

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