Pier 36
299 South Street
New York, 10002

This year's Independent doubled in size, relocating from Tribeca's Spring Studios to the expansive Pier 36 on the Lower East Side. The neighborhood, home to a grittier and more experimental art scene, seeped into the fair's curation and vitality. From the threshold, a curtain of yellow PVC strips, brightly lit to an electric glow, halted visitors to, of course, take a selfie. Through the tunnel and into a more dystopian dimension, photographs blown up into wallpaper by artist Nikolas Ventourakis lined the walls, depicting magnified piles of trash, satirical and pointed, inviting viewers to revel in the obscure. This new energy extended to the exhibitors themselves, with nearly half of the 76 galleries making their debut at the fair.

There was a buffet of ceramic delicacies to feast upon: functional and sculptural, figurative and abstract, large and small, on plinths and hanging from the wall – ample options for the New York collector, whatever precious space they may have left or, if lucky, square footage yet to be claimed.

The solo ceramic booths were anything but uniform: Johan Samboni's brick installation at SGR Galería read as an archaeological excavation, its carved brick relics totemic and ancestral, whereas Hoster Burrow's presentation of Marianne Nielsen's delicate porcelain and stoneware was gentler, imitations of foliage preserved before crisping and decomposing. Double V Gallery exhibited Maximilien Pellet, whose earthenware ceramic panels are alive with bird motifs, and Schenkweitzdoerfer featured Keiyona C. Stumpf's multilayered, provocative yonic sculptures that move between nature and body.

Mindy Solomon Gallery traveled from Miami to present Brittany Mojo's gorgeous, lively coil pots. The Sunday Painter returned, this time showing works by Nicholas Pope and Gillian Lowndes. Uffner & Liu exhibited Sacha Ingber, whose ceramic furniture and wall sculptures are witty and charming (not least a pot serving as the base of a table leg).

There were moments where ceramics whispered, subtle yet integral to the process or incorporated in tiny touches. At Moskowitz Bayse, Anthony Miserendino's relief sculptures, cast in acrylic pigmented with clay slip, form rigid, towering tapestries. At Fredericks & Freiser, Louisa Owens tucks ceramic elements into her papier-mâché landscapes.

Atla Gallery held a prime central location, its low, long plinths presenting two Japanese artists, Kuniko Kinoto and Yoshinori Tanaka, sandy and sedimentary, crystalline and geode-like, respectively. Their works, though distinct, shared coarse surfaces and glistening glazework, both seemingly forged by nature itself.

Here are the eleven galleries we selected as ceramic highlights of this year's Independent.

Mindy Solomon Gallery

Miami, United States

Brittany Mojo

Mindy Solomon Gallery brought a taste of Miami's exuberant energy to New York with a dual presentation of Brittany Mojo's ceramics and Terri Friedman's textiles, two artists who celebrate craft traditions while pushing them into a modern vernacular. Together, their kaleidoscopic color palettes complement each other brilliantly. Mojo's vessels are coil-built from stoneware mixed with paper clay, achieving a thinness and fragility that questions the functionality of the form. The surfaces dance with underglaze patterns of triangles, diamonds, and flowers, framed by thin black lines that follow and accentuate the dimpled, textured surface.

SGR Galería

Bogotá, Colombia

Johan Samboni

Jupiter

New York City, United States

Ry Rocklen

The first time I encountered Rocklen's work at last year's NADA, I was enchanted. There is something wry and refreshing about the way he marries ceramics with photography, layering narratives into a single form. The glaze decal on the surface shows surrealist desert imagery blended with the identity of the object itself, flat and self-contained at first glance. Turn it around and the real surprise reveals itself: unglazed findings nestled within the form as if windswept and settled, some appearing to hold up the piece entirely. Random at first glance, they are a puzzle, the narrative on one side incomplete without the hidden curiosities, the artist inviting you to find the thread.

Hostler Burrows

New York, United States

Marianne Nielsen

Atla Gallery

Los Angeles, California

Kuniko Kinoto | Yoshikazu Tanaka

In a sea of booths, Atla Gallery's presentation of Japanese artists Yoshikazu Tanaka and Kuniko Kinoto is impossible to ignore, their glazed surfaces glistening beneath the baroque lighting, transfixing. Tanaka's playful process is one of regeneration: fragments of past pieces broken apart, reassembled, and transformed, with found studio materials (glass, metal, and lightbulbs) fired together in the kiln, emerging as densely rich collages. Equally layered are Kinoto's crystalline forms, informed by her glaze research at the Shigaraki Ceramic Research Institute in Shiga, home to one of Japan's six ancient kiln sites. Instinctive in process, rigorous in craft, and irresistible in presence.