Ruby Neri

Ruby Neri (b. 1970, San Francisco) draws upon 20th-century West Coast traditions and a global catalogue of art historical and anthropological modes. She depicts the human body as a porous instrument of pleasure, terror, and everything in between, placing her in a lineage of Los Angeles-based artists like Mike Kelley and Paul McCarthy. Her focus on hand-driven craft connects her to the Bay Area Figurative and Funk movements. Over the last 20 years, Neri has been a leading figure in the revival of ceramics as a contemporary art medium. Her vessels evoke earthy tactility and psychological intimacy, while her use of sprayed glazes links her ceramics to the street art she produced in the late 1990s as a member of the San Francisco-based Mission School, blending contemporary urban art with the archaic power of pre-historical wall-painting and object-making.