Andrew Casto, 2011 MJD Fellow
resident 2011–2012
 Andrew Casto was born in Delaware, Ohio. He received his BA from Earlham College in Indiana, and his MFA from The University of Iowa. He has served as an adjunct assistant professor at Augustana College in Illinois, Knox College in Illinois, and The University of Iowa. Most recently he received the 2011–2012 Archie Bray Foundation’s MJD Fellowship.
Casto’s sculptural objects create metaphorical links between personal narratives and physical forces of erosion and entropy. He was recently awarded the FuLe Prize by the International Ceramic Magazine Editors Association in Fuping, China, and has been featured in several other national and international exhibitions. When not working in the studio, he is a lover of music and college basketball.
“My current body of work follows an autobiographical inquiry into the formal relationships objects, bodies, and relics undergo when subjected to the downward pull of gravity. Gravity in this context serves as a metaphor for the daily responsibilities a new father faces, specifically when confronting an uncertain future.
Beginning with this premise, I embrace the deconstruction of objects familiar to my history as a ceramic artist. Vessels and figurative pieces are created, and then broken down through various methods into elemental components. The remaining structures are subjected to an accumulation of porcelain casting slip, texturing work, underglaze, glaze, and luster applications through multiple firings. Objects are often combined with mixed media additions to compliment conceptual methodology.
The structural language present in the work mimics erosion, geological stress, and disintegration. Resolving this surface treatment in gold luster suggests that additions of emotional weight in our lives can serve as creative opportunities for refinement and purification, rather than functioning as tools of our undoing."
To see more work of Andrew's visit his website at andrewcasto.com.
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