David Haskell: Boom Beach

Designing the 21st Century Podcast

David Haskell is the award-winning editor-in-chief of New York Magazine. Trained as an architect at Yale University, he is passionate about urban design and was one of the early proponents of bike-sharing in New York City, which ultimately led to the launch of the CitiBike. He co-founded Kings County Distillery, producing whiskey at the waterfront Brooklyn Navy Yard, which is also the site of his own studio. It is here that David works with clay, creating pieces on the pottery wheel and forming sculptures in his own voice. I am hosting him here today in celebrating his upcoming solo exhibition ‘Boom Beach’ at Donzella LTD Gallery in New York.

There is a certain allure that has become attached to contemporary studio ceramics in recent years. It is a part of the renewed interest in the handmade, a movement which emerged as a response to the increasing digital world. The crafted object emphasizes authenticity, sustainability, and personal, emotional expressions while signifying an interest in materiality and in elevating the individuality. Clay is particularly intriguing because it is powerful, layered, and complex. It has been used to express gender, identity, poetic storytelling, and even political statements.

David Haskell’s biomorphic objects are composed of collapsed forms and elements, first shaped on the wheel as geometrical forms, and then manipulated and assembled into free and abstract compositions, becoming organic sculptures of immaculate surfaces and intriguing shapes. I hosted him in the second episode of the spring season of Designing the 21st Century about his vision, work, and why clay matters.