Vicken Parsons Artists Buttons
Vicken Parsons
Buttons, 2023
Button dimensions: variable
Set of Six, in an edition of 30
The button(s) have been hand sewn onto an A5 cards. Each card is numbered, dated and signed by the artist and presented in a bespoke box designed by A Practice for Everyday Life.
Vicken Parsons has created leaf-like forms in clay, each one unique and individually handmade by the artist. ‘I took a small piece of clay in my hands and pressed it three times using equal pressure with both hands and this form emerged.’ After a bisque firing the buttons have been dipped in ultramarine slip and fired again at a high temperature. They extend Parsons’ subtle exploration of the boundary between abstraction and representation and her fascination with colour.
Parsons is best known for her small, vibrantly coloured paintings which often recall architecture or landscapes. Her works are executed in thin, almost translucent layers of oil paint on small panels of wood. She says of her work: ‘I like the contradiction of making a large space within a small thing, and then within the small thing, the space opens up again.’
About the Artists Buttons project
Ten leading artists, Ai Weiwei, Jonathan Anderson, Rana Begum, Edmund de Waal, Antony Gormley, Callum Innes, Jennifer Lee, Cornelia Parker, Vicken Parsons & Caroline Walker, have been creating limited edition sets of buttons in support of Kettle’s Yard.
The project draws inspiration from the exhibition, ‘Lucie Rie: The Adventure of Pottery’, recently at Kettle’s Yard and from 14 July 2023 – 7 January 2024 at the Holburne Museum in Bath. In 1938, Lucie Rie fled her home in Vienna for London to escape the Nazi persecution of Jewish people. During the war, unable to get a licence to make pots, Rie turned to making ceramic buttons for the fashion industry, experimenting on a miniature scale with new forms and coloured glazes.
Read more about the Artist Buttons project on the Kettle’s Yard blog
Please note purchases of Artists Buttons per customer must not exceed £8,500. Any order exceeding £8,500 will not be processed.
