At over seven and a half feet tall, Bonds XIII compresses the human figure into a sharpened vertical axis. Its unusually slender proportions intensify the sense of upward pressure, transforming the segmented ceramic body into a declarative presence rather than a ceremonial one. A vivid yellow glaze, disrupted by dark, corrosive splashes, animates the surface with friction, activating the figure through contrast and interruption rather than continuity.
At over seven and a half feet tall, Bonds XIII compresses the human figure into a sharpened vertical axis. Its unusually slender proportions intensify the sense of upward pressure, transforming the segmented ceramic body into a declarative presence rather than a ceremonial one. A vivid yellow glaze, disrupted by dark, corrosive splashes, animates the surface with friction, activating the figure through contrast and interruption rather than continuity.
Here, Crisafi’s dialogue with modern and contemporary art shifts decisively toward gesture, scale, and material force. The aggressive interaction between glaze and surface recalls the expressive violence of postwar Italian ceramics, particularly the legacy of Leoncillo, where color operates as rupture rather than ornament. At the same time, the sculpture’s height and reduced width align it with postwar abstraction’s pursuit of impact through proportion, echoing works that privilege silhouette, tension, and ascent over symbolic completeness.
Within the Bonds [Legami] series, Bonds XIII redefines connection as strain. Crisafi presents a sculpture that asserts itself through instability, offering a charged counterpoint within the series—one in which connection is inseparable from tension, and unity is achieved only through confrontation and scale-driven intensity.
