Collection Focus: Sergei Isupov

February 23 – June 8, 2014

Sergei Isupov
Ray, 2009
Glazed porcelain
Racine Art Museum, Promised Gift of David and Jacqueline Charak
Photography: John Polak

Collection Focus: Sergei Isupov—a mid-career retrospective for an innovative artist who has pushed the possibilities of clay. Interested in exploring the dynamics of human relationships, Isupov (born in Stravapol, Russia, 1963) has found a distinctive artistic voice that combines two-dimensional narrative with three-dimensional ceramic form. Imbuing his work with social, cultural, and personal history, Isupov investigates the dynamics of the human condition through complex and compelling compositions. In his pieces, figures in all states of dress or undress—often in isolated or abstracted landscapes—morph and shift as animals become part human or vice-versa.

Isupov is descended from artists—his father imbues paintings with humor, his mother creates sculptural clay vessels of imaginative subjects, and his brother works in mixed media and video. Graduating in 1990 from the Art Institute of Tallinn, Estonia, with both his BA and MFA in ceramics, he won early recognition for his ceramic efforts and was offered an invitational scholarship to the Oslo International Ceramics Symposium the same year he obtained his master’s degree. Shortly after arriving in the US, Isupov was quickly recognized as a talented artist and championed by collectors who helped him become an active participant in the contemporary American ceramics community. Since 2003, he has been living in Massachusetts on the same property as gallery dealer and friend, Leslie Ferrin, in a renovated mill that houses living spaces, studios, a gallery, and gathering sites for artists.

More About the Exhibition

Exhibition Catalogue, available for purchase on the Online Museum Store

Exhibition Notes (PDF)