David Ray is a contemporary ceramic artist, working and living in the Yarra Valley, on the traditional lands of the Wurundjeri people in Victoria. His ceramics have built a reputation for being wild and flamboyant Baroque creations that incorporate an abundance of colours, textures and decals onto handcrafted vessels.   David Ray’s art provides a wry commentary on contemporary consumerism and the less celebrated aspects of Australian Cultural life. 

Ray explores the products of eighteenth-century ceramic manufacturers including Wedgwood, Spode and Sèvres as representations of conspicuous consumption. The notions of display and privilege inherent in these objects inform his work which questions the role of ceramics in society as both utilitarian objects and as symbols of wealth and status.  His work subverts classical forms with contemporary concerns and often explores the complex relationship between beauty and ugliness.   The ‘hand of the maker’ is an idealistic notion he holds dear within his making process and is always distinctive within his work through the intentional contrast between the consistency and refinement of manufactured porcelain with his irregular, hand-molded shapes.

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