Sandra, the hands of Asperitas
When I was 17 years old I ended up almost by chance in a cultural exchange to Beijing organized by my school. There, I tried pottery for the first time and, inevitably, I fell in love with it. I didn’t immediately give in to pottery though, as life brought me elsewhere for a while.
For work, study or whim, I travelled a lot and lived in many different countries, among which Spain, Germany, France, and Turkey. It was in Portugal that I finally stopped and learnt how to sculpt and to work on the potter’s wheel, while I worked as a tourist guide.
The pandemic brought me back home to my hometown in Italy, Gorizia, where I worked as an assistant at a local pottery studio and where, in 2021, I opened my own studio.
Whats does Asperitas mean?
Asperitas means many a thing.
In latin it designates something rough, like the clays I like to use, with stone-like texture and coarse to the touch. It can also describe a composition that is rich in movement and contrasts, where harsh parts are balanced with soft ones. So am I and so is my artistic production: complex and different in its many parts.
Finally, the word may refer to a kind of clouds as well: the Undulatus Asperatus, a rather rare kind of formation, which involves storm-like clouds naturally dissipating and leaving a clear sky.
This is also my wish for every person that gives a home to one of my pieces or that visits my lab: a sky that always clears up.
Exhibitions
2023 – Safe Space, San Giovanni di Casarsa, 22/12 – 23/12
2023 – Relazioni, San Francesco Church, branch of Civici Musei di Udine, Udine, Italy, 10/05 – 18/06; Trieste, Central Station, 11/08 – 29/10
2023 – Cerámicas Actuales, Centro Cerámica Triana CCT, Seville, Spain, 15/03 – 15/04
2022 – Artkeys Prize – Finalists Exhibit, NEXT, Capaccio – Paestum (Naples), Italy, 19/11 – 27/11
2022 – E luce fu. Materia Illuminata, Dueunodue Spazi Espositivi, Bologna, Italy, 10/09 – 29/09
2022 – 1000 vases, Galerie Joseph, Paris, France, 08/09 – 12/09
2022 – Le Città Invisibili, Santa Maria dei Battuti Church, Cividale del Friuli (Udine), Italy 26/05 – 17/07
2022 – Manipolazioni (personale), MADA – Temporary Lab & Co, Cividale del Friuli (Udine), Italy 29/04 – 01/05