Nickola Pottinger on her show of sculptures at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum

The Jamaican British theorist Stuart Corridor referred to as cultural id “a matter of ‘changing into’ in addition to ‘being’”, a nod to the duality of post-colonial existence. The artist Nickola Pottinger takes this dichotomy head-on in her first solo museum exhibition, fos born, on view on the Aldrich Modern Artwork Museum in Ridgefield, Connecticut and curated by the establishment’s chief curator Amy Smith-Stewart.

Pottinger’s emotive, natural sculptures, totems to her Jamaican heritage and West Indian upbringing within the Crown Heights neighbourhood of Brooklyn, implicate the viewer in their very own “matter of ‘changing into’”—fraught, ferocious undertakings stuffed with previous magic and new views.

She calls these figures duppies, a reference to the chimeric, night-walking spirits of Jamaican folklore, and constructs them from furnishings, bones, chicken cages, gilded Yagua leaves and a panoply of different recycled supplies that toe the road between trash and treasure. Her creatures are draped in pigmented paper pulp that Pottinger creates from household paperwork, rubble and first drafts utilizing her mom’s handheld kitchen mixer, one more layer within the private and cultural palimpsest of her follow. Pottinger’s ghosts have a presence that’s each unsettling and hypnotic, inviting viewers into her historical past.

Fos born attracts on the latest beginning of Pottinger’s daughter, Zora, as its thematic centrepiece. The marvelously lumpy Give tanks and praises (2025) incorporates a solid of the artist’s pregnant torso, positioning the act of human creation as each a young and carnal course of.

This sculpture is one in every of a set of name new works paying tribute to motherhood that the artist created specifically for the exhibition. Whether or not hanging from the wall, sitting on a pedestal or mendacity on the ground, Pottinger’s humanoid reliquaries discover familiarity within the seemingly unknown, braiding disparate narratives collectively into talismans. There’s a flux to those sculptures, a way that their “changing into” may occur at any second and in any anarchic trend. A part of this pressure lies in Pottinger’s penchant for line—initially educated in drawing, not in sculpture, she developed a extremely private, speculative process for her duppies, lending them a singular, haunting high quality.

The Artwork Newspaper caught up with Pottinger to speak ghosts, spirits and childhood bedrooms.

The Artwork Newspaper: Are you fascinated about how these figures speak to one another within the galleries when you’re planning a present?

Nickola Pottinger: This was truly my first time actually inserting the works for an exhibition of mine. Beforehand, I made the work, after which the gallerist and I might simply set it up. This time, [Aldrich chief curator Amy Smith-Stewart] and I sat down with a ground plan I had drawn out and my husband printed photos of every of the person works and we mocked it up; we wished to make it possible for it had a way of the narrative all through the three rooms by which the works are proven.

There’s some older work in there—the genesis of the follow that started as a wall aid was from a present in 2022. We had been making an attempt to be very considerate about how the work has developed over time and find out how to spotlight the best way themes and supplies reappeared all through the work. Even the location of the work—for one of many bigger sculptures, there are drawings on the floor that mirror the gestures of the bodily sculpture that is diagonally throughout from it.

All of it occurred intuitively. I do not go into a piece saying, “I will make a goat.” I study and make by way of utilizing my arms. There is a channeling course of as I am working that takes me to a different place. And so I am at all times rewarded with this shock, this present in the long run. I might say 75% of the best way by way of the work, I’ve a greater understanding of the course by which I am going. After which there’s an enhancing course of that occurs as properly the place I am constructing, however then additionally breaking it down bodily, both throwing the work or breaking the work and constructing it once more.

Once you speak about making as a type of enhancing, is there a way of regeneration within the work? How does that affect the best way we’re inspired to consider these figures?

I come out of a robust drawing follow and have drawn for a number of years. I at all times wished to discover sculpture, however was intimidated by it, and by no means took it at school, in all probability as a result of it was the most costly class and it was at all times largely males taking the category. I type of graduated from making these collage works, which I made based on the identical ideas as I described. It is at all times breaking and constructing. In a paper format, I used to be tearing and chopping up my very own drawings and constructing these surfaces and textures. They had been fairly huge and quilt-like. It nonetheless used a number of a few of the supplies I take advantage of now, like oil pastels and watercolours. 

Through the pandemic, after I was house and I used to be spending far more time with household who additionally lives close by, we’d get collectively in our yard and we’d inform tales. I might go to my household house and acquire issues that had been in my sisters’ and my room rising up. We nonetheless have e-book studies and ceramics that we made in highschool. I had principally foraged my childhood bed room and brought it house with me.

Earlier than lockdown, I used to be enthusiastic about making artwork in a special atmosphere and never reaching for a similar instruments on a regular basis, to interrupt that behavior and train a special muscle. My husband, who’s additionally an artist, paints and makes sculptures and does movie, so there was this very nice cross-pollination of supplies and modes of constructing. At the moment, these reliefs for me had been type of symbollic by way of the feel aid that I used to be creating after which additionally aid emotively at the moment. They had been totems for me; I used to be making them at house and hanging them in our lounge. 

I used to be actually nervous returning to the studio after I felt secure to be round different individuals. I used to be actually nervous about how the brand new reliefs would sit with my collaged paper work, as a result of I used to be very delicate concerning the development and I did not wish to veer off path. I used to be introducing these wall aid works to my paper collage works and it made sense to me. This was the correct course to go. So I obtained a blessing from my drawings to proceed to pursue this format of constructing.

It felt good that it was nonetheless utilizing paper, which was at all times a medium within the work however grew to become so particular as a result of it was archives and paperwork from both my mother and father at house, my grandparents or my sisters. By recontextualising them, I may assume again to all of the issues that I’ve discovered and the tales I didn’t know. I discovered 37 years later that I type of considered these archives and paperwork as a special type of storytelling—not by mouth, however on this three-dimensional kind. A whole lot of the work is about constructing upon legacy, and a number of it’s homage to household, my heritage, my ancestors and the way I used to be raised.

Being a mom impacts the artistic course of immensely. Did it change the best way you considered creation and the best way you performed your follow?

I had identified about this present since earlier than I did [Art Basel Miami Beach with Mrs. Gallery in 2023], so I had a while to consider it. I did two exhibits again to again and I used to be exhausted, so I took a break for a couple of weeks after which discovered I used to be pregnant.

The most important work within the present, I started whereas I used to be pregnant. I’m accustomed to engaged on the ground, to getting bodily with my items. I believe anybody that paints [or] makes sculpture is aware of that making artwork may be very bodily. I had a tough time; I nonetheless obtained in there, however I moved sluggish. At the back of my thoughts, I used to be actually excited to see the work rework after having our child, and that grew to become a mantra for me. I used to be like, “I really feel like it may change the best way I work as a result of I am gonna be in a special way of thinking.” That is all I saved fascinated about. I used to be actually curious what me post-pregnancy was going to be like.

There’s two of the works which might be within the present which might be casts of my stomach. I used to be considering for some time, “Ought to I solid my stomach? Ought to I do that? Do I wish to put this into the work?” It is already autobiographical, so I ended up having my husband go into the studio with me and he solid my stomach. That evening, the minute the solid was drying on my pores and skin, I began to have contractions. After which two days later I had Zora. I felt like she was at all times in collaboration with me all the being pregnant. My mindset was that I used to be simply doing all of it for her. So yeah, it was onerous, however I would not change any of it.

Do you see your function as an artist as a religious one? Do you consider your self as an inventive agent or as a vessel for concepts?

I really feel like I am the one making the work, however I additionally really feel like there is a larger self I’m speaking with. I am a vessel in some methods as a result of I am a container for my very own spirit. I am at all times making an attempt to attach with spirit. I am at all times fascinated about what spark of magic or uncooked emotion comes out within the work, as a result of that feels sincere.

Even with the best way the work is made, like utilizing my mother’s cake mixer that she had me combine black cake each vacation throughout Christmas, I’m comforted that a few of my childhood is working with me and I am working with it. It’s bizarre working with my youthful self after which issues get revealed that receded into the again of my reminiscence, which is like at all times actually stunning and a present on the identical time. Typically I take into consideration grandparents I grew up with which might be not right here, and I take into consideration grandparents which might be nonetheless right here however stay distant. They’re very a lot part of the work, too, as a result of I attempt to make work about issues that I do know. And I do know solely as a lot as I do about my private historical past and what my household has been by way of and what we have lived. It’s actually vital that I am listening to myself and on this state of channeling these recollections and ideas after I’m making the work.

Nickola Pottinger: fos born, till 11 January 2026, on the Aldrich Modern Artwork Museum, Ridgefield, Connecticut