Hailing from small town Arkansas, Lane Chapman started out as a painter and illustrator until she transitioned into clay in college. She received her BFA in Ceramics from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock in 2017. After graduating, she moved to Rochester, NY for a two-year residency at the Flower City Arts Center. She then moved to Missoula, MT for a residency at The Clay Studio of Missoula for two years from 2019-2021 and then a resident at Wildfire Ceramic Studio from 2021-2022, also in Missoula. Lane completed a residency with OpenAIR Montana in the summer of 2024 and is currently an MFA candidate at the University of Montana in Missoula.
The interactions between humans and objects has always intrigued me; in the way we perceive, react, and consume tangible objects. I believe humans have a symbiotic relationship with objects. We humans are mass consumers, but what if we consumed differently? While drinking our morning coffee, what if we also consumed a subtle message to appreciate the small things that are often overlooked: the insects buzzing by the window, the dew on the grass, or the singing birds in the trees? For me, pottery is mutualistic, the pot benefits from its use as much as I do, much like the symbiotic relationships between living organisms and their environments. By bringing into play living organisms, I’m bringing awareness to their life cycles, their role within the ecosystem, and the parallels of these concepts found within human life.
I create and illustrate handmade utilitarian vessels for daily use. My illustrations speak to the beauty of the “small world” and their importance within our ecosystem. Humans can be disturbed by what they see around them, insects, bones, and dead animals. But without these organisms, we might all be dead, quite literally. Insects couldn’t survive without plants, plants couldn’t survive without insects, and humans couldn’t survive without either. While the interconnectivity of life goes unnoticed, humans are affecting the environment now more than ever. In reaction to this, I direct viewers to see the disgust amongst the beautiful, to see the disgusting as beautiful.