Ben Mazey

Mazey steers his practice with simple mathematical rules and a DIY, grungy sensibility. Starting with a rectangle, he contorts his material to a varying yet repetitive degree; he moves between mediums, from slab-built ceramic to wax-cast bronze, with dualities—as seen in the half-polished, half-patinated finish of this show’s totems—lo-fi palettes, and layered glazes. Assembled from emotional and aesthetic cues, his sculptures of familiar household objects subvert the domestic with their mimetic quality, as if from a cartoon world.

For this exhibition, Mazey stages two human-scale bronze totems that possess a character straddling court jester and gate guard. Their circle and square shapes stack and interlock, reminiscent of 1980s children’s wooden house kits. He also introduces his first foray into terracotta; by applying a platinum lustre glaze, he charges the traditional, ancient medium with a futuristic essence. Functional lighting sculptures incorporate handblown glass—made in house at rage—suggestive of interior design frills, while ceramic parts have been rolled and shaped using a foam pool noodle. The exhibition also expands on his flag series with a newly developed complex glaze that augments a pull-and-stretch effect across their wave-like bends.

In pursuit of cathartic nostalgia, these pieces channel the decorative, camp substance of the naively homemade. Mazey pulls from his inner and outer worlds, unmasks his flamboyant side, and imbues unexpected, delightful references that range from Blade Runner and The Flintstones to Art Nouveau. The exhibition’s all-caps title voices this joyful yet nihilistic register: mortality, as an unfathomable concept but inevitable fact, is not worth agonising over. Viewers are nudged away from cynicism toward the restorative, whole-hearted optimism at the core of Mazey’s practice.