About

ARTIST'S STATEMENT: I’ve long been captivated by stories of my ancestors—both my early Mormon ancestors and my queer/trans ancestors. My work comes out of an ongoing rummage through what I inherited—everything from histories to belief systems; from body language to memorabilia. What mythologies guide, or haunt, our lives—either knowingly, or unknowingly? I see these ancestral figurines as ghosts who inhabit my world, but ghosts I can pick up and play with.

BIO: Ray Farmer is an American artist (British/German ancestry) raised in Utah and currently based in Brooklyn. They earned an MFA degree in sculpture from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and work in a variety of media, including hand-built ceramic sculpture, installation, photography and video. Most recently, their work was featured in the exhibition A Greater Utah at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art; and Ceramics Now at Jane Hartsook Gallery (NYC), featuring work by the four fellowship/resident artists at Greenwich House Pottery in 2021. Previous residencies include Space on Ryder Farm (2019), the Museum of Arts & Design (2016), and Brush Creek Arts (2014). In 2013, they were awarded an A.I.R. Gallery Fellowship, that culminated in a solo exhibition. Additional solo exhibitions include site-specific installations for Granary Arts (UT, 2018) and the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art (NYC, 2017).

Group exhibitions include Material Issues: Strategies in Twenty-First Century Craft at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, Expanded Visions: Fifty Years of Collecting at the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art, Beyond the Bed Covers curated by Laura Petrovich-Cheney (A.I.R. Gallery, NY), Torn and Fired: new work in collage and clay curated by Jason Andrew (Outlet Fine Art, Brooklyn), Illegitimate and Herstorical, curated by Every Ocean Hughes (A.I.R. Gallery, NY), #throwbackthursday / #flashbackfriday, juried by Scott Chasse and Hrag Vartanian (Calico, NY), and Land + Place + Performance, curated by Laura Allred Hurtado (Granary Arts, UT).

INSTAGRAM: @rayrfarmer

NOTE: All ceramic sculptures are made from unglazed stoneware clay. Standing figures are between 5-6 inches tall. Please get in touch for more detailed information.