For the past six decades or so, Ron Nagle has been pursuing parallel careers as a sculptor and musician. His small-format ceramic sculptures are simultaneously miniature landscapes, abstract compositions, thoughts turned into form, and visual jokes – Nagle’s humor and his penchant for puns and wordplay find expression not only in his song texts, but also in the titles of his sculptures. Thus the artist turns phrases such as “finishing touch” into titles such as “Finishing Touchéz” – although Nagle always emphasizes that his titles bear no relationship, in terms of content, to his objects, and should not be regarded as keys to the understanding of his works.
