Michele Oka Doner

American artist Michele Oka Doner has developed a body of work spanning more than five decades, shaped by the forms and structures of the natural world. Her practice encompasses sculptures held in the collections of major museums as well as monumental public installations, including works for the Herald Square Subway Station in New York, Miami International Airport and the Sacramento Central Library. She also designs jewellery, furniture and objects for everyday use. Michele Oka Doner lives and works in New York and Miami Beach, Florida.

For Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg, Oka Doner created an extensive cycle of works in porcelain, terracotta and stoneware in 2008 and 2010. These include the Soul Catchers, hundreds of small anthropomorphic sculptures in glazed porcelain, as well as large-scale unique figurative works such as Distraught Goddess, Priestess, Ancient Man and Early Man, and the fragmented Ancestors. The Ceremonial Cups, Libation Bowl and Libation Plates are vessels in which functional object, sculpture and ritual object merge. The works were made at Nymphenburg and some were presented in the manufactory’s historic kilns as part of the installation Down to Earth. They combine Oka Doner’s visual language, informed by natural forms, archaic objects and the human figure, with the distinctive craftsmanship of the manufactory.

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