Clay, Fire & Food

with Edward Cabral & Maxwell Holden
CERAMICS 669 001 | 3 credits | $250 Lab Fee
August 10–23, 2025

Preparing and sharing meals represents one of the most intimate relationships we have with the earth. With plates made from clay, forks pulled from mountains, and ingredients cleaved from nature, this class will uncover how clay feeds us by learning an abridged history of fire, earth, and food. From Jell-O molds to contemporary art, we will explore the role of ceramics in facilitating artwork at the table. Students of all levels are welcome to join this course, which will include demonstrations of techniques for effective hand-building, throwing, firing, and finishing. In addition to time spent in the Ox-Bow kitchen, the course will have a substantial seminar component. Discussions will introduce students to various histories of mealtime ceramic design and collective making and meal planning. In addition to reading Gaston Bachelard’s The Poetics of Space and watching Peter Greenaway’s The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover, we will consider the work of Erica Lord, Roberto Lugo, Clare Twomey, Michael Rakowitz, Mel Chin, Dirt Waffles Collective, Félix González-Torres, Daniel Spoerri, Stephanie Temma Hier, Stephanie Shih, Alison Knowles, Ettore Sottsass and the Memphis Group, Adrian Saxe, and Eva Zeisel. Together we will plan and cook a final food presentation, supported by wood-fired ceramic wares. In addition to working toward the community meal, assignments will include “Spirit of the Fire,” for which students will construct a totem representing fire.

Maxwell Holden

Edward Cabral, Fornacalia, 2023, wheat, egg, and butter, 7.25 x 10.75 x 0.75 in.

Edward Cabral (he/him) is a sculptor and chef living in Brooklyn. His research-based practice encompasses traditional art, edible sculpture, performance, and impermanent objects. He received his BA in Visual Critical Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2011. He has exhibited at Williams College Museum of Art, Massachusetts; Roots and Culture and Heaven Gallery, Chicago; Alexander Gray Associates, The Drawing Center, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, and Superhouse, New York. He has been interviewed in Mold Magazine, Architectural Digest, and CakeZine, and has appeared on the History Channel, Disney+, and The Food Network.

Maxwell Holden's (he/him) career has included both time abroad and within industry, encountering highly creative engineers and artists embracing the sciences. The result has amounted to a passionate interest in the absurdity of modern life, and our quest to find meaning in endless abundance and scarcity. Maxwell is particularly interested in food after nearly a decade spent as a farmhand and many more years making a range of dinnerware, including a collaboration with Blue Hill.