A Minute With Niki Ford

Hi! This is a newsletter about artists I like.

I began acquiring art through some friends that worked in galleries. I started small, working on a limited budget, for stuff I could afford. As time passed, my collection grew, and it was exciting to watch many of the artists I'd collected go on to bigger shows and critical acclaim. My goal with this newsletter is to make a digestible resource for anyone interested in artists that are making great (and still affordable!) work, whom you haven't heard about... yet.

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I came across Niki Ford’s work through Kirk, founder of La Loma Projects, and was immediately hooked. We haven’t had too many artists on here with a focus on ceramics, although their work is not limited to just clay, so here we are.

Niki’s show opens Saturday at La Loma @ 5pm with Jieun Reiner. Please go and support Niki & Jieun if you live in LA.

Can you talk about your style and practice?  

Niki with their incredible work. 

NF: I channel otherworldly, yet somewhat recognizable, narratives through drawing/painting and ceramic sculpture. A given piece might journey through bodies, water, plants, landforms, poetry/prayer, histories/time and vortexes of every kind. My work also leans into the corporeal, intuition/inspiration, devotion, the liminality of queerness and gender non-conformity (as I am queer and non-binary), dream states, emotion and healing. 

As far as process is concerned, I work with line, texture, liminality, vibration, color, repetition/pattern, deviation from repetition/pattern, sympathetic gesture and repair. I would also consider the work to very much be design and textile adjacent.  In the past I’ve referred to my practice as ‘psychedelic brutalism’ as it combines spirit work, intuitive construction and process driven aesthetics. 

I often feel like I am an archeologist or restorer with the pieces. I invite breakage, repair in an attuned way and bring them into being/recreate them with a real commitment to the vessel/object. I prefer the aesthetics/concepts of repair and stewardship over much else. 

Sometimes I wait until I see something clearly, sometimes I begin by slowly building the piece in my head. Other times, I build and finish the pieces in several stages and spend a lot of time staring them until they tell me what is next. I do this to properly imbue them with the textures and resonance that exist beyond the act of their making. Whereas, when I paint, my focus is often on the vibration, energy and intensity of the lines and colors. Both the clay work and painting involve my relationship to following instructions and getting lost.  

Let’s talk about your show with La Loma (past guest)..how long have you been working on this for and anything else that our readers should know?  

NF: I started to imagine non-linear time (aka Kairos/ deep time/god time) as a kind of garden—a place that I could encounter in visions and retrieve the work. I made the first multicolored ceramic pieces and the painted triptych in a small cabin in Landers, California, a place that helps me to ground my instincts. Then I returned to LA where I continued to work. 

The work for the La Loma Project show began in the summer of 2022, just after my first solo show and LA debut at The Lodge gallery. I worked on the pieces for Jeweled Earth, through June of this year. 

Part of this time was spent at a queer artist residency, the South Jetty Artist Residency, in Bandon, Oregon. While there I made the ceramic chair called ‘owls in the garden” and the vessel called ‘fugue-striped vessel with dome lid.’ Both pieces contain impressions from the rather expressive coastal pine that sat between my charming cabin and the art studio. 

When I make work, I’m always conjuring the proverbial room, because I am worlding. It was deeply fulfilling to collaborate with Kirk Nelson, the gallerist, on the arrangement of the room because he has a high sense of the relational and experiences my work in a ‘lost civilization” way.  

Does living in LA have an influence on your work?  

NF: I live and work in a replica of Stratford Upon Avon in Beachwood Canyon. I am told that MGM built it for a film and that Bette Davis lived in my unit as a young starlet! I am surrounded by artists and musicians, bougainvillea, bird song, fountain sounds and the beautiful Old Hollywood details of the neighborhood.  I love the energy of this place and it inspires me endlessly.

For our readers that may not have access to seeing shows and going to galleries, what resources (online, books, music, etc.) would you recommend?  

NF: I recommend the NTS radio app, World Of Interiors magazine, Instagram accounts: @nonakahillgallery, @mepaintsme, @bridgetdonohue.nyc, @lefebvreetfils, @adamsandoldman, @v_over_m, @emmagrayhq, @tierradelsolgallery, @jackhanleygallery, kanopy.com for Los Angeles Library film rentals, Clay in Color podcast by Angelik Vizcarrondo-Laboy and Alex Anderson, to name a few things…

What else do you have in store for fall 2023?  

NF: I self-published an oversized, psychedelic coloring book about grief called Good Grief! Something You Can Color. I’m excited to announce that it will be stocked at the 

MOCA Geffen store when they reopen in November.  

I’m also looking forward to return to the studio. I’m just beginning to ponder the new threads that will lead to the work for the next shows in Los Angeles and Montana, but the details are under wraps for now! 

Who should we have on next? 

NF: Lily Ramirez

We love a good studio shot, can you share some pics of your workspace?

Linkage Report

• A NY Times article came out earlier this week on “newer and younger artists,” having more say in who gets to buy their work.