Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
1 6

Michael Gustavson

Color Wheel - Coffee Table
$7,800
$7,800
Sale Sold out

Michael Gustavson

$7,800
$7,800
Sale Sold out
Raku-fired glazed ceramic
30"×26"×19"

Raku-fired glazed ceramic

30"×26"×19"

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Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
Color Wheel - Coffee Table
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About

The Piece

The tabletop is freeform and organic, its edge irregular in the way that hand-formed clay always is. Across the surface, bold leaf and crescent shapes in deep navy, red, orange, yellow, and green move through a field of deep blue, with smaller circular forms sitting quietly among them. Fine lines drawn through the glaze before firing are locked permanently into the surface, a detail that reveals itself only when you get close.

Gustavson describes himself as a painter-sculptor, and this piece makes that clear. Inspired by Miró and Kandinsky, he treats the tabletop as a three-dimensional canvas, building colour and form through layered glazes before the kiln resolves them into something final. The deep crackled blue of the cylindrical base is distinct in texture from the smoother top, the two elements sitting together naturally without competing.

A table that functions as a painting you can put things on. The surface rewards the kind of attention most furniture never asks for.

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About

The Artist

The Artist
About

The Artist

Michael Gustavson is a California-based ceramic artist who builds upon the traditional Japanese process of raku, reimagining it through a distinctly contemporary and highly personal methodology. His work bridges free-form organic sculpture and painterly abstraction, distinguished by unusually vivid, luminous color rarely achieved in ceramic sculpture.

Central to Gustavson’s practice is a firing approach he has developed and refined over decades, evolving from but ultimately departing from traditional raku. Rather than removing works from the kiln, he introduces pine needles at lower temperatures to create the reduction atmosphere while the pieces remain inside. This highly individual, studio-developed method allows him to work at significant scale and achieve exceptional chromatic depth and painterly nuance in glazed ceramic. Few ceramic artists pursue color with this level of painterly ambition.

Over a four-decade career, Gustavson has pushed the expressive potential of clay, developing a controlled yet highly responsive surface language. Describing himself as a painter-sculptor, he treats each form as a three-dimensional canvas built through layered glazes, textures, and color interactions. His vessels often suggest the human figure in motion, while his wall reliefs activate negative space as an integral compositional force. Large-scale outdoor sculptures and benches extend this painterly vision into powerful tectonic forms.

Inspired by Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Wassily Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, and Jackson Pollock, Gustavson’s surfaces often feature controlled dripping and expressive movement, translating the energy of abstract painting into fired clay.

Gustavson earned his MFA from San José State University in 1980. His work is held in major public and private collections worldwide, including IBM, Kaiser Permanente, Seagate, Cranbrook Museum, and Eastman Kodak.

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