Artpace Exhibit by Foerster Builds Characters, Creates Monsters

August 5, 2022 - San Antonio

By Ashley Rocha, Staff Intern | San Antonio Sentinel

Michael Foerster, a San Antonio native, has created a ceramic art exhibition titled “Every Time We Say Goodbye.” The title comes from the 1944s Cole Porter song but really struck Foerster when Lady Gaga covered it on her “Cheek to Cheek” album in 2014.

“It’s kind of funny, because if you’re looking at my exhibition and you don’t know about the song, it can seem counterintuitive because the characters are so bright and vibrant,” Foerster said. “It is actually a deeper reflection on what saying goodbye is really like.”

Foerster’s work is an exploration of several different ideas and emotions, such as trauma interpersonal relationships and how they degrade over time.

“It’s a conversation between myself and the visitor,” he said.

While looking at his memories through rose-tinted glasses, he focuses on specific people and places in his life and takes elements of those things and combines them to create his little monsters.

While building his creatures, he thinks of them as brand-new toys since they are so clean and vibrant. Then he puts them through a process called pit firing, which is the oldest known method for firing pottery.

“It’s very primitive. It’s essentially a huge bonfire with flames that get several feet tall,” he said. “Things are breaking, it’s hot, it’s smoky, it’s chaotic… and I’m taking these things that are representative of the people I remember so fondly and I’m destroying them almost.”

Foerster sees this firing technique as a representation of the human condition – what time does to memories, relationships and people.

“I see these sculptures as very literal representations of people and how fragile they can be, and how outside forces have such a large hand in shaping and changing a person.”

Every piece he creates has taken a lot of inspiration from the people in his life. One piece, called Bran, takes inspiration from a friend who passed away, named Brandon. The face on the piece also takes inspiration from the cartoon “Adventure Time”.

The piece called Kevin was inspired by a field trip Foerster went on in middle school. After being told to form groups and create a group name, he and his six friends got together and decided on Kevin, thinking it would be funny for the instructor to call out a “normal” name for a group of seven kids.

The piece has seven faces for the seven kids, and the shape was inspired by the shape of the hills in the background of a Mario game.

Christian Ramirez, the residencies and exhibitions manager at Artpace, said, “[Foerster] is a very kind and thoughtful artist,” which is clearly seen by his intricate thought process.

While his art has such a deep meaning, it only seems to be fun and lighthearted if you don’t know the backstory. Foerster calls the cute and colorful pieces in his exhibit “Floops.”

“I embrace the spontaneous, so I don’t know where Floop came from,” he said, “but a lot of my work is influenced by my past and childhood, and I’ve noticed that my work looks toys and candy, and that Floops almost sounds like Fruit Loops.”

“When I was a kid, I was obsessed with the Spy Kids movies, and the bad guy was called Floop… so maybe it slipped into my subconscious somehow, but I’m not entirely sure.”

“I have enjoyed watching visitors interact with his work,” Ramirez said, “the Floops bring a lot of joy to the gallery.”

Sploots are unfired pieces that are considered seed bombs. The Sploots contain wildflower seeds native to San Antonio. Playing with spontaneity again, Foerster makes these pieces and places them around the city in areas where they will thrive.

“Sploots are on a timeclock, because when it rains, they will dissolve and leave the seeds behind, and hopefully flowers will grow,” he said. “So, when someone sees one, for that small timeframe, me and that person have a moment of connection.”

Ceramic artwork can also be functional and utilitarian, so Foerster has created Floops that emit incense. “I had some strong moments that struck me while pit firing – these pieces have already gone through being in an extremely violent, smokey area, so I wanted to introduce them to a calm atmosphere with a gentle element of smoke.”

Foerster feels that this relates to the human condition again, by going into something chaotic or violent, then coming out on the other side and producing something calm and pleasant.

“Every aspect of the artwork should be thoroughly considered by the artist,” Foerster said. “Everything I do with my art is intentional, and that is really important.”

*Photos Courtesy of Artpace San Antonio, by Beth Deviler and Chris Mills

Ashley Rocha is from Bovina, Texas, where she graduated from Bovina High School in 2019. She is currently attending Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas. She is majoring in journalism and minoring in communications and women’s and gender studies and is expecting to graduate in the fall of 2022.