Verne Funk • American (b: 1932)
Steppin Out • Clay 70" x 27" x 18.25"
Verne Funk loved the camp and elegance of ballroom dancing. During the day, he was a typical ceramics student making functional pottery at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. At night he made ends meet by Putting-On-The-Ritz in the nostalgic dance rooms he enjoyed. Shortly after graduation Funk met laid-back West Coast potter Robert Arneson and learned to combine his love of camp and ceramics. The “Father of Funk Art” taught the dancing potter some funky new steps.
Arneson, a long-time ceramics professor at the University of California-Davis, was turning pottery on its head with his California Funk Art movement. Before him ceramic art was functional. After, it was art. He spent two weeks teaching a summer ceramics workshop at the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Maine. Verne Funk was attending the program during a lull between his Bachelor and Masters studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
Funk Art … meet Verne Funk. As the alliteration might lead you to believe, it was a Funkadelic match made in pottery heaven.
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Funk Art encouraged artists to create sensuous, passionate and quirky works that shared their lives, personalities, and experiences. Created mostly in northern California in the 1960s and 70s, Funk Art was humorous, senseless, vulgar, or just downright absurd. After meeting Robert Arneson, Verne Funk stopped making symmetrical wheel-thrown pieces, exclusively. Instead, he hand built ceramic art works as free flowing as he was on the dance floor. He also created functional ceramics with funky images using his superb drawing abilities.
Funk’s first major Funk Art piece was a life-sized vacuum cleaner with teeth and lips at the end of the hose. He called it the Electrosux. Using personal experiences, he created many pieces like Steppin Out at the Canton Museum of Art – a tall totem-like clay sculpture with 1940s dancers blending into one as they danced to the music. “Yes, my knowledge of ballroom dancing led to this work. But, don’t forget the nostalgia — Fred and Ginger, the 40s, big band music, elegance, smoke-filled clubs and a touch of camp was a part of my life, too.”
Funk used to be a dancer who made pots. Now he’s a potter who dances. The switch happened when he let his inner-funk out.
Canton Museum of Art Permanent Collection • From the James C. & Barbara J. Koppe Collection, 989.4
4 Ways to Sound Smart When Viewing at The Canton Museum of Art
1.
“He was a ceramics student by day and ballroom dancer by night. The dancing helped pay his way through school.”
2.
“Verne Funk became a Funk Artist after meeting ‘The Father of Funk Art’ Robert Arneson. Trying saying that three times fast.”
3.
“His early Funk Art works were parodies of manmade objects and machines. He now makes large figural sculptures like this one.”
4.
“Funk taught his funky brand of ceramics for 40 years. Can you imagine having a professor who wants you to make art that makes him laugh?”
Funk Timeline. Scroll over images to see timeline.
