I create design objects with bold and stylized surface patterns – which feature tessellations, optical and geometrical illusions – by integrating innovative digital fabrication methodologies with traditional ceramic processes. The emotional drive and creative intention is to challenge and expand viewer’s and user’s perceptual assumptions when experiencing a minimalist yet complex functional design object.
Inspired by the Gestalt Theory of Visual Perception – where the mind tends to find order and logic in what the eyes see – I design patterns to instigate a dialogue between form and surface. I use lines and curves to distort and add dynamism to the surface of the work, and I use seams and negative spaces to create contrast and tension within a form.
The way that patterns are framed within a form, where they are cut, assembled, and overlapped, alludes to the process of film editing – assembling separate but related parts to create a sequence that is larger than the sum of their parts. Additionally, the patterns’ reliefs add a surprising tactile experience when the work is held, touched, and used.
I fire my work in both atmospheric and electric kilns, constantly advancing my explorations surrounding the synergy of forms, surface design, and materials research.
Biography
Yael is a US-based Italian artist of North African descent. She received a Bachelor of Arts in Graphic Design from the European Institute of Design in Rome, and a Master of Fine Arts in Cinema from San Francisco State University. In 2021 she received the Multicultural Fellowship Award from the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA). Her work has been exhibited in Museums and Art Galleries across the United States and in Japan, and is also part of permanent collections in the United States. She has been a Ceramic Artist in Residence in the United States and in Japan.
Yael Braha creates functional ceramics with bold black and white designs. Lines, curves, and patterns both distort and add movement to the surface of her work while physical seams - where two clay slab edges meet - create contrast and tension within the form. The way the graphic patterns are cut, assembled, overlapped and framed produces a stimulating visual experience while the surface pattern reliefs provide an equally interesting tactile one. Braha’s ceramic pieces are illusions of movement that you can hold, touch, and use.
