Visions in Porcelain: A Rake’s Progress

Visions in Porcelain: A Rake’s Progress presents the work of Bouke de Vries, an acclaimed artist working with ceramics, whose latest work responds to William Hogarth’s famous series.

Inspired by Hogarth’s series of original paintings at the Soane Museum, de Vries draws on his love of storytelling, and talent for symbolism through ceramics, with eight newly created porcelain vases presented in various states of (dis)repair. Starting with an immaculate celadon vase, de Vries treats the following seven increasingly deteriorating vases with a variety of restoration processes and glazes, which parallel the moral and physical degeneration of Hogarth’s anti-hero Tom Rakewell. Cracks appear in the surface, the vessels slump and implode – with obvious and drastic methods of repair failing to save the vase or Rake from their ultimate demise.