Description
Frank Olt
Red, White, Blue and Gold, 2022
Glazed ceramic with custom lucite frame
15 x 15 in
Artist’s Statement:
Frank Olt’s abstract work form a unique hybrid of ceramics and painting in the New York school tradition. Forged in his signature style, they combine ceramic media and glazing components with mixed media; rich hues from encaustics bring together the small not-quite-symmetrical abstract pieces in a way that sometimes recalls the color field artists, though often suggesting landscape.
Although a practitioner of more traditional ceramic techniques, many of Olt’s works fuse painted canvases and ceramics; this contrasts the glossy surfaces of glazed pottery with the elegant linen painted using encaustic (heated beeswax and colored pigment that cools and affixes to the canvas). Known for this innovative harmonizing of materials as well as painterly use of interesting glazes, his recent work also continues experimentation in releasing discernible subjects from the layered elements; machines as well as horizons, suns, and cloud forms.
Frank Olt is an artist and professor at Long Island University whose studio practice focuses on ceramics and painting. He is a former artist-in- residence at MoMA P.S.1. He studied with Bauhaus artist Rose Krebs. Olt exhibited and has collectors nationally and internationally. His commissions include all ceramic art at the 23rd & Ely subway station through the NYC Arts for Transit program and Bellevue Hospital. His work was exhibited recently in a one-person show in the Contemporary Gallery at Nassau County Museum of Art.
