NINA ELSE
Biography
Originally trained as a painter, Else started a transition in 1989 from painting and collage to ceramic sculpture, but has managed to keep a foot in both camps. Else’s work is unified by an abstract, bold graphic use of saturated color and a sense of playfulness. All her work is hand built, using low-fire glazes and stains, and masonry epoxy. The element of collage is most evident in her wall pieces and her two sided rotating tableaux. Her box “games” crossed into interactive sculpture---almost toys---and the garden pod pieces also demonstrate her whimsical exuberance. In 2006 she began building much larger and more figurative sculptures.
Nina Else grew up in the Santa Cruz Mountains south of San Francisco, California. She went to Peninsula School in Menlo Park, and then to high school in Montevideo, Uruguay. She graduated from San Jose State College in 1973 with a BA in painting. She was affiliated with the co-operative Gallery House in Palo Alto from 1984 to 1998. Her ceramic work was handled by Virginia Breier Gallery in San Francisco from 1992 until it closed in 2006. For many years she was represented by Tercera Gallery in Palo Alto and Claudia Chapline Gallery in Stinson Beach, until both galleries closed in 2009. She has been an exhibiting member of the Association of Clay and Glass Artists of California since 1995.