Occupation: Ehren Tool Exhibition

Berkeley resident and Marine Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War, ceramic artist Ehren Tool will conduct a residency at Space One Eleven February 22-24, 2016, and his work will remain on display through April 29, 2016. By crafting ceramic cups with graphic images of soldiers or bombs, Tool hopes to inspire honest conversations about war and its implications.

Tool will be onsite at Space One Eleven, downtown on 2nd Avenue North, working in its gallery turned ceramics studio to share his works in progress and to encourage public conversations. Members of the public–especially our military community–are invited to observe or collaborate with Tool in the creation of cups by bringing photographs or military insignias to be copied onto the vessels. Participants can take their cup home following the closing of the exhibition in April, 2016.

Tool has given away over 15,000 cups since he began making them in 2001, saying he cannot put a price on objects that represent soldiers’ lives. He will be giving away all of the cups he makes during his residency at Space One Eleven.

Tool’s 1.5 Second War Memorial, a series of clips of ceramic cups being shot, will be on view during the exhibition. Viewers choose a war to memorialize, and watch the film for 1.5 seconds for each person that was killed during that war. If a viewer wanted to watch it for everybody killed during WWII, for instance, they would have to watch the film for nearly two years. Also on display at Space One Eleven is Samford University Associate Dean and artist, Larry Thompson’s, The Infanttree Project, which is Thompson’s response to America’s insulation from the carnages of war.

For more information about Ehren Tool, please see the clip from the PBS series “Craft in America” at http://www.craftinamerica.org/shorts/ehren-tool-segment/. For more information about Larry Thompson and The Infanttree Project, visit his website at http://www.artbylarrythompson.com/the-infanttree-project.html

Space One Eleven is a visual arts organization founded in Birmingham, Alabama in 1986. Space One Eleven’s mission is to provide professional opportunities for artists, create a forum for public understanding of contemporary art, and offer arts education to area youth.