Austin Flowers is the ceramic alter-ego of artist Natalie Popovski. Taking the mundane and squishing into something beautiful.
"For the most part, I consider myself a painter. Clay was more of a means to an end. You see, I spent years painting the seemingly insignificant corners of mess from the inside of strangers' homes. Your bedside table, your kitchen bench… kind of like ‘you are what you eat…’ but more so, ‘you are what you choose to keep.’ The brands you buy, the ornaments you put on display, the way you do or don’t decorate your house all say a lot about you. The paintings were meant to act as indirect portraits of these people, using the mundane to highlight quirky nuances about them, and more often than not, tongue-in-cheek.
Clay only came into my life after I had the urge to pull out some of the items in my paintings, and slip-casting seemed like a new and interesting option. It started off with the Saxa Salt and the Hendricks Gin bottle based on the two paintings below. And the name, Austin Flowers, was simply because it’s hilarious and adorable at the same time."