Lanphere & Kane "Fire & Fiber" Award Winning Circus Mixed Media Installation 2016

A complete mixed-media circus installation in five components — four individual sideshow acts and a two-piece ceramic circus ring — representing the collaborative work of Milette Lanphere and Suzanne Kane, awarded Second Place at the Fire & Fiber 2016 biennial exhibition at the Branigan Cultural Center, Las Cruces, New Mexico. A Certificate of Authenticity accompanies the work.

Fire & Fiber is the signature biennial of the Potters' Guild of Las Cruces, pairing ceramic artists with fiber and mixed media practitioners to produce collaborative works that cross disciplinary lines. The 2016 exhibition ran June 3 through July 2 at the Branigan Cultural Center before traveling to the Deming Art Center. This piece placed second among works by more than sixty participating artists.

To understand what Lanphere brings to needle-felting, it helps to know who she is. She has spent most of her life on a seven-acre farm outside Las Cruces — home to horses, donkeys, dogs, chickens, cats, and all manner of wildlife. Felting is a slow, physically demanding art that works against the grain of impatience. Every figure here required sustained, purposeful attention — fiber by fiber, form by form. These are not generic circus animals. They are portraits. They are chosen. They are known.

The installation unfolds as follows:

The Ring — two curved ceramic arena sections in vivid red with navy blue–striped bases, arranged to frame the performance space. Kane's hand is evident throughout: the surfaces are rich, the glaze work confident, the forms architecturally considered.

The Equestrian Act — the centerpiece and largest piece: a needle-felted bareback rider in a red dress, dark curling hair, holding a conductor's baton aloft, astride a dark brown felted horse in full muscular canter. Ceramic green spotted botanical elements in Kane's hand flank the path. The horse is not decorative. The proportions, the weight distribution, the movement of the legs — this is the work of someone who has spent real time with real horses.

The Ladder Act — three dogs ascending a red glazed ceramic pyramid, its surface worked with interlocking circles in deep red and gold, with found wooden dowel rungs. The casting is exact and deliberate: at the bottom, a Bulldog — heavy, determined, improbably committed to the climb. In the middle, a Poodle — elegant, compliant, the consummate performer. At the top, a Jack Russell — wiry, alert, already looking past the summit for the next thing. Anyone who has spent time with dogs will recognize each of them immediately.

The Stacked Balls Act — three hand-built ceramic balls, each uniquely glazed and decorated in Kane's bold palette, stacked in a tower on a painted ceramic base. Atop it all: a needle-felted Terrier wearing a voluminous red satin ruffled collar, playing ringmaster with complete conviction.

The Lion Act — a needle-felted cat, wearing a lion costume, standing on a ceramic circus pedestal in red and dark green. The fire hoop beside him — a felted ring of orange and yellow flame on a ceramic ball base — awaits. The cat's expression communicates precisely what any cat pressed into circus performance would communicate. This is the funniest and most honest piece in the set, and it required the most intimate knowledge of its subject to pull off.

Together these components form a complete world — a miniature circus animated by the specific, personal, unhurried attention of an artist who built it from life. The ceramic elements carry Kane's technical command; the felted figures carry Lanphere's anatomical knowledge, her humor, and her decades of animal observation. The collaboration produced something neither could have made alone.

A Certificate of Authenticity accompanies this lot. This is a documented, award-winning, publicly exhibited work — the fullest expression of Lanphere's practice, and the piece that earned her a place on the exhibition podium.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Milette Lanphere has spent most of her life in the Mesilla Valley of southern New Mexico, on a seven-acre farm outside Las Cruces — home over the years to horses, donkeys, dogs, chickens, cats, and all manner of wildlife that found its way to her door. For years she was also a licensed falconer, one of fewer than thirty active practitioners in the state of New Mexico, before setting that chapter aside around 2005.

What falconry gives you, above all else, is an education in anatomy. You learn how a creature is built — how it moves, where the weight sits, what the face does under stress. That knowledge does not leave you. It shows up in the felt.

In her past lives, Lanphere was a member of the Mesilla Valley Fine Arts Gallery in historic Mesilla and the Potters' Guild of Las Cruces. This installation represents the fullest public expression of her practice — and the piece that earned her a place on the exhibition's podium.

Suzanne Kane is a Las Cruces-based sculptor whose work is held in the permanent collections of the New Mexico State Capitol, the Archie Bray Foundation, Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, and the Las Cruces Museum of Fine Arts, among others. Her ceramic elements in this collaboration — the intricately worked ring sections, the glazed and painted bases, the stacked decorative balls — demonstrate the technical command of an artist with a substantial and documented exhibition history.

CONDITION

Excellent. No damage noted across any of the five components. Ceramic glazes remain vivid and unchipped. Felted figures retain full texture, color, and structural integrity. The red satin collar on the Terrier ringmaster is intact. The fire hoop is undamaged. Please refer to all provided photographs for a complete visual assessment. Certificate of Authenticity included.

DIMENSIONS

Largest component (Equestrian): 12" H × 8" W × 10" D Smallest component (Lion/Cat): 7" H × 3" W × 6" D Sold as a complete five-component installation.