Garth Johnson, Curator’s Talk: Saturday, October 8, 2016, 6:00-7:00 pmOpening Reception and Lecture are FREE and open to the public.Recorded Matter: Ceramics in Motion, features twelve, internationally based ceramic artists integrating video into their studio practice. Organized and curated by Garth Johnson, Arizona State University Art Museum Ceramics Research Center Curator.With the dawn of social media comes a new generation of artists who grasp the power of video not just as a tool to document process, but as an inextricable element of their work. Recorded Matter is an exploration of the range of expression that video offers — from viral videos showing artworks being used (or more often, abused) to mysterious inquiries into material and philosophical properties of clay.Asked to reflect on the genesis of the exhibition, Johnson remarked, “I honestly don’t think that this exhibition would have happened if it weren’t for social media. A new generation of artists has emerged that innately know how to use video to tell their story.”Physical objects accompany several of the videos showcased in the exhibition. One of the most powerful examples is Recycled China by Thomas Schmidt and Jeffrey Miller, who are both Americans who taught and made work in China. During their time together in China, Schmidt and Miller started crushing cast-off plates (taken from the virtually limitless supply in the porcelain capitol of Jingdezhen) with a steamroller. The crushed porcelain shards were then taken to an industrial foundry and smothered in molten aluminum. The resulting tiles are both mysterious and ethereal — delicate porcelain shards are suspended like sedimentary rocks in a primal, metallic ooze. The 5-channel video of their process recently helped win a Bronze Prize in the Korean Gyeonggi Ceramic Biennial, perhaps the most prestigious exhibition of its kind. Schmidt is a North Carolina-based artist currently teaching at University of North Carolina, Charlotte.