Public Lecture: Aspen Golann & Christopher Kerr-Ayer

Please join the Metalsmithing Department and 3D Design Department in welcoming Aspen Golann and Christopher Kerr-Ayer. Golann is an artist & furniture maker blending early American Furniture forms with sculpture and social practice, and Kerr-Ayer is an artist & glassmaker whose work stretches from conceptual sculpture to functional housewares. In this joint lecture they will be speaking about their respective practices and craftsmanship.

Cranbrook Academy of Art’s 2023-24 Public Lecture Series is free and open to the public in the deSalle Auditorium at Cranbrook Art Museum.

Aspen Golann is an artist & furniture maker blending early American furniture forms with sculpture and social practice. Trained as a 17th-19th century woodworker, Aspen engages the moral complexity of reproduction furniture by appropriating the aesthetics and antiquarian processes of early America. Her artwork is exhibited nationally has been featured on NPR, PBS and published in The New York Times, Architectural Digest, Elle, Luxe, Fine Woodworking, and American Craft. She serves on the board of The Chairmaker’s Toolbox, A Workshop of Our Own, The Furniture Society, and The Society of Arts + Crafts. She has received support for her work from The Windgate Foundation, United Artists Foundation, Winterthur Museum, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, The Center for Furniture Craftsmanship and others and is the recipient of the 2023 Award in Craft from The Maxwell Hanrahan Foundation and The Mineck Furniture Fellowship from The Society of Arts & Crafts.

In 2020 Aspen founded The Chairmaker’s Toolbox—a project fostering access and equity in the field of chairmaking. In support of the project, she has partnered with museums, schools & chairmakers around the world. Aspen teaches craft workshops internationally and in the furniture department at The Rhode Island School of Design. She holds a degree in furniture making from The North Bennet Street School in Boston, MA & lives and works in Southern New Hampshire with her partner.

Christopher Kerr-Ayer was raised in rural Vermont. He started learning about glass in 2009, as a Junior in High School. He holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Johnson State College, Vt. Learning about and working with glass in a production studio setting gave Kerr-Ayer the time to practice and refine important skills for working with the material. His collegiate studies, workshops, and residencies have exposed him to a breadth of design, aesthetic, and history of glassmaking. His work stretches from conceptual sculpture to functional housewares. His interest in investigating the line between functional and nonfunctional objects is what drives him to make new work. He interprets everyday objects as a way to disassemble identity, fragility, and objects themselves.

Working for a number of glassmakers over the past decade has given Kerr-Ayer studio access to develop his work. His work includes functional housewares, figurative, and trompe l’oeil sculpture. He currently lives in Rollinsford, NH, where he maintains his studio practice, as well as making objects for THE POOL GLASSWORKS, his design forward housewares company.