Seisler, Nicole

In her City Souvenirs project, Nicole Seisler orchestrates walks around various cities and invites participants to make physical impressions of the city in wet porcelain clay blocks. The artist states that she uses “walking as a tool for art making, and creating tangible connections between people and place.” As such, Seisler builds collections of objects that reflect the relationship between individuals and the urban landscape, and how the architecture and distinct elements in one’s environment influence how people behave in a city. Like photographs, the clay acts as a conduit to heighten an individual’s observational capacities and conveys the sense of cataloguing one’s experience. Dissimilar to photographs, the clay directly imparts the sensation of touch and a physical connection to one’s surroundings. But like photographs, the resulting impressions become records of particular exchanges between people and places. Although each clay imprint is unique as an image, it resembles the photographic negative or file in its capacity to make the same impression over and over.

Nicole Seisler completed an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2011) and a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (2004). Her work has been presented in exhibitions at the Evanston Art Center, Illinois (2012), the Elmhurst Art Museum, Illinois (2012), and the Museum of Fine Arts, Tallahassee, FL (2007), among others. She has taught ceramics at many universities, including School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Lake Forest College, the University of Washington, UCLA, and Lewis & Clark College.