"The Things I Want to Tell You," April D. Felipe, Andréa Keys Connell, Kensuke Yamada

The Jane Hartsook Gallery is pleased to present a three-person exhibition of work by April D. Felipe, Andréa Keys Connell, and Kensuke Yamada. United by a passion for using figurative ceramics to tell stories about human connection, each artist engages a different aspect of the figure’s narrative qualities to playfully tease apart the more difficult parts of being human.

Inspired by his experience immigrating to the United States from Japan, Yamada’s figurative sculptures are vessels that contain emotions that bridge language and cultural divides. Their expressions are mutable, allowing us to see ourselves reflected in them, our interpretations of his figures fluctuating each day as our feelings do. Keys Connell uses the aesthetics of figurines and statuary to reflect on the truth and the absurdity of archetypes. By remixing this familiar imagery, Keys Connell encourages us to reframe the narratives we create about who we are and how to be.

Felipe uses the figure—often in parts or abstracted—combined with elements of domesticity to think about the narratives we tell ourselves, within families, and societally. By invoking the idea of a childhood home along with our lived and cultural histories, Felipe considers how we use storytelling to create a sense of belonging. The work in this exhibition strives to explain all the things we want to tell each other that we struggle to express, but never stop attempting to by telling and retelling our stories.

April D. Felipe is an Ohio-based artist and co-organizer of The Color Network. Felipe earned her MFA in ceramics from Ohio University, and her BFA from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University. Her work has been shown throughout the U.S. including at Reeves House Visual Arts Center (Woodstock, GA; 2023), Belger Arts Center (Kansas City, MO; 2022), Grounds for Sculpture (Trenton, NJ; 2022), and the Akron Museum of Art (Akron, OH; 2021). She has been an artist in residence at the Archie Bray Foundation and was a Ceramics Monthly Emerging Artist in 2017.

Andréa Keys Connell is a North Carolina-based artist and currently an associate professor at Appalachian State University. She earned her MFA from Ohio University and her BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art. Her work has been shown internationally including at Morean Center for Clay (St. Petersburg, FL; 2023), Weston Art Gallery (Cleveland, OH; 2021), and Gaya Culture and Art Center (Goryeong, South Korea; 2019). She has been a visiting artist at Miami University and SUNY – Buffalo State University and has taught workshops at Penland School of Craft and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Kensuke Yamada is a California-based artist and currently an assistant professor at California State University, Chico. He earned his MFA from the University of Montana, Missoula and his BFA from The Evergreen State College. His work has been shown throughout the U.S. including at Duane Reed Gallery (St. Louis, MO; 2022), Blue Spiral Gallery (Asheville, NC; 2022), and Windgate Museum of Art (Conway, AR; 2021). He has been an artist in residence at the Archie Bray Foundation, the Clay Studio Philadelphia, and Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, and was a Ceramics Monthly Emerging Artist in 2012.