ARTISTS IN RESIDENCE

Sergei Isupov is an Estonian-American sculptor internationally known for his highly detailed, narrative works. Isupov explores painterly figure-ground relationships, creating surreal sculptures with a complex artistic vocabulary that combines two- and three-dimensional narratives and animal/human hybrids. He works in ceramics using traditional hand-building and sculpting techniques to combine surface and form with narrative painting using colored stains highlighted with clear glaze.

Sergei Isupov and Ferrin Contemporary Director, Leslie Ferrin, purchased and renovated the Project Art building in 2004. Sergei and his wife Kadri are now permanent residents of Project Art where they both offer workshops, classes, and demonstrations throughout the year.

Sergei’s work is also on view in Ferrin Contemporary’s galleries and showrooms at Project Art.

Kadri Pärnamets works in porcelain using traditional hand building and sculpting techniques to combine surface and form. Her biomorphic, organic forms provide a means to convey her personal interests ranging from fragile, natural environments to female identity. Her surface treatments feature a range of gesture and expression with either abstract shape or narrative figure painting, inspired by painters from the European Renaissance and Impressionist eras, like Lucas Cranach the Elder and Edouard Manet.

Kadri currently lives and works at Project Art. She teaches a weekly clay class to the local community and offers year-round workshops and demonstrations. Kadri’s work is also on view in Ferrin Contemporary’s galleries and showrooms at Project Art.

Paul Scott is a Cumbrian-based artist with a diverse practice and an international reputation. Creating individual pieces that blur the boundaries between fine art, craft and design, he is well known for research into printed vitreous surfaces, as well as his characteristic blue and white artworks in glazed ceramic.

A combination of rigorous research, studio practice, curation, writing and commissioned work ensures that his work is continually developing. It is fundamentally concerned with the re-animation of familiar objects, landscape, pattern and a sense of place.

His current research project New American Scenery has been enabled by an Alturas Foundation artist award, Ferrin Contemporary, and funding from Arts Council England. More on New American Scenery, here.

Paul spends most of his year in Cumbria, UK, however his US homebase and studio resides at Project Art. Paul’s work is also on view in Ferrin Contemporary’s galleries and showrooms at Project Art.

A self-described “son of the South,” Russell Biles was born, raised, and still lives in the southern U.S. He remembers playing around with clay at a young age, making animals and monsters, but it was not until he entered college to study architecture that he was re-introduced to art and ultimately to ceramics. Since his graduation Biles has been a studio artist in Greenville, SC, working in sculptural forms that range from large totems reminiscent of Northwestern Indian work to small, carefully crafted, colorful porcelain figures. He is best known for the latter work which confronts the direction in which society is moving and finds it severely lacking. Biles uses such American icons as the Cleavers and the Cartwrights as well as contemporary newsmakers to satirize social, religious, and political issues and to engage the viewer in the discussion. Biles employs irony and satire in his work and believes that the humor inherent in satire tempers the  critique and hopefully produces a thoughtful reaction rather than an automatic rejection. As important to Biles as the message is the craftsmanship of his work, the quality that gives the work integrity and cements his position as a noted artist whose work is included in a number of both private and public collections.