Kelsey J. Bowen makes playful and storybook-like ceramic pieces of woodland animals and human children with animal heads that play and frolic together. However, these pieces carry a dark undertone as they are meant to show the adverse effect human activities have wrought on animal life. Bowen’s ceramics depict, among other things, human children with wolf heads biting while riding horses. Meanwhile, rabbit-headed children care for pet deer, sometimes even unintentionally harming them. These animal-headed human children are symbols of the human species as a collective.
By giving human children animal heads, the pieces underline how, biologically, humans are no different from any other animal. Therefore, the pieces question why human beings should be treated any better than any other animal. “Why has there been human superiority?,” asks Bowen, a critical question to ask at a time when human activity has caused biodiversity loss so significant that scientists call it the sixth mass extinction. Hence, Bowen’s ceramics are powerful advocacy pieces for animal rights. This is why they are aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of Life on Land.
One piece, titled Lest They Wilt comes across as especially poetic. Unlike other pieces, viewers cannot see what this human child looks like, perhaps they have an animal head, perhaps they do not. Their face has been completely covered by a large bouquet of freshly cut roses, thus the piece’s title, Lest They Wilt. The child’s hands are visibly covered in scars, scratches from holding the roses’ thorn too tight. They are running away with the roses, as if feeling guilty that they’ve stolen them from their bushes. This piece feels ambivalent, its title conveys good intentions, and yet viewers understand that the roses would have had a better chance at living longer within its bush.
It is the personification of the age old saying “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” A rather rare take on today’s need for nature conservation, cautioning that conservation and preservation efforts should always be done with precaution so that they do not create more harm than good. Conservation scholar, Rosaleen Duffy, once outlined in her book Nature Crime: How We’re Getting Conservation Wrong, how this is already an ongoing phenomenon.
She explained that western-style conservation approach assumes that people are enemies of wildlife conservation, all while putting conservationists on a pedestal as saviours. In turn, this has led to the displacement of local people, as their land was now deemed natural reserves. Ostracizing locals pushes them to perceive wildlife as further threats, continuing the vicious circle of wildlife deterioration that Bowen cautions against.
Kelsey J. Bowen’s ceramics are a poignant reflection on the complexities of human impact on the natural world. Through her whimsical yet haunting depictions of animal-headed children, Bowen masterfully critiques the Anthropocene, emphasizing the intertwined fate of humans and animals. Her works challenge viewers to reconsider the assumed superiority of humans over other species, highlighting the devastating consequences of this mindset, which has driven the planet to the brink of a sixth mass extinction.
Find out more about ceramics by Kelsey J. Bowen on her website www.kelseyjbowen.com or her Instagram @kjbowen.