Ceramic Dinnerware
Title: A Place at the Table
Artform: Ceramic Table Settings
Goals/Objectives
Borrowing from Judy Chicago’s groundbreaking feminist work, “The Dinner Party,” ceramic plates and goblets are used to honor both famous Jewish trailblazers (the plates), as well as contemporary women in the community (the goblets), each with a place “at the table.”
Studio Work
Participants research a renowned woman as the subject of their dinner plate. While we often look to history for inspiration, we know we can also find it close by. Each accompanying goblet is designed to celebrate a local woman whose life echoes the values of the plate’s trailblazer.
Participants can begin their research about famous women with the JWA Women of Valor online or poster series or the Shalvi-Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women. In parallel, they select a community woman to interview using JWA resources. (See Artful Disclosure Toolkit Part I.)
After the research and interview, participants sketch ideas for their dinnerware working with design, symbols, and metaphors that visually express their subjects’ values and accomplishments.
Materials
- Bisque (unglazed white ceramic) dinner plates, purchased from a paint-your-own ceramics studio
- Sketch paper and pencils and tracing paper
- Acrylic paint and brushes
- Mod Podge glue for collage
- Small three-dimensional objects
- Images and photographs from magazines and internet
Inspiration
Judy Chicago’s art installation at the Brooklyn Museum, “The Dinner Party”
Sheila Myer Miller and Barbara Ellison Rosenblit, Pentimento: Revealing Women’s Stories
Exhibition
Celebrating the finished work in a gallery-like setting elevates and honors the students’ work.
A set table (72”x36” folding table) with artfully designed plates and goblets can be very moving as an art installation. Any hallway or foyer space can be effectively used for display.
Tips
Use a lightweight unprimed canvass instead of a tablecloth to cover the table and add stenciled silverware to evoke a conceptual table setting. Place cards with the name of the honoree can be tented by the place setting, or laminated artist statements can be set up next to the exhibit placed in a clear plastic holder.
