Nature 2.0
Nicolas Touron and Amy Lemaire
Exhibition dates: September 18 – November 20, 2023
Reception: Friday, September 22, 5-7pm
Related event: Amy Lemaire flameworking demonstration on Saturday, September 23

2022-23 Ceramics Program Artist In Residence Nicolas Touron and glass artist Amy Lemaire's ongoing collaboration explores the shapes of the natural world using 3D ceramic printing and glass. The works in Nature 2.0 were produced and developed in the new 3D clay printing area of the Ceramics Program, Office for the Arts at Harvard.

Their work exists in the past and future at the same time, and is concurrently of flora, fauna, and technology. Lemaire, a glassblower, utilizes a craft invented over two thousand years ago, while Touron uses the contemporary technology of 3D-modeled and printed ceramic. As a result, their works include thousands of years of human innovation as they regard the effects of these achievements and technology on nature. In this sense, their technique and subject matter parallel one another: Lemaire and Touron reveal, in the physical sense and the philosophical, what nature can look like in sync with humans and their technology. 

The works combine two materials produced by each one of the duo. The ceramics created by Touron function as the base of the sculptures. Often resembling medieval fortresses or futuristic temple, they function as a stage for the story to be told. Lemaire’s glass work, colorful and even more organic in form, is whimsical and delicate much like nature itself; sometimes they look like otherworldly plants or fungi, sometimes perplexing figures or animals. They represent the actors in this theater. 

As an artist, Lemaire considers the role of technology as an accelerant in a multiplicity of narratives that weave together virtual and physical worlds. Touron, who also uses storytelling as a crucial part of his art, constructs narratives without specific beginnings or ending, and in this way become visual embodiments of the living process of storytelling. Together, their work tells a tale of our time: an ongoing story of growth, coexistence, and time.