Untitled/Pot #8 from the Ohio Series

While teaching at Ohio’s Kent State University approximately a decade after four students were killed during a Vietnam War protest, Peter Gourfain completed a series of ceramic reliefs and large non-functional terracotta pots such as this one that addressed the incident through general themes—the potential ineffectiveness of communication, government oppression, symbols of evil, historical parallels, and the human condition. The cumbersome nature of the works themselves are metaphors for the weight of the thoughts and ideas.