Glassell: Echoes of Imagined Futures
Voice, Sound, & Ceramics
I’m delighted that my sonic works are part of Jeff Forster’s marvelous sculptural ceramic exhibit, Reverent Formations, at The Museum of Fine Arts Houston’s Glassell School of Art.
Jeff Forster: Reverent Formations
Alcove Sound Works by Misha PentonSeptember 5th - Reception 6-8pm
Join us, details here. Free
On view: August 9–September 28, 2025
‘In Reverent Formations, Jeff Forster transforms the everyday by products of the ceramics studio into raw, expressive sculpture. Forster, head of the ceramics department at the Glassell School of Art, fuses chance and intention, working with leftover clay, broken kiln shelves, glaze overspray, and other studio remnants—materials often seen as waste—to create works that feel both ancient and urgent.’—Museum of Fine Arts Houston.
Jeff and I have chatted about collaborating for a long time and we are finally embarking on projects together. His stunning and dynamic exhibit, Reverent Formations, occupies the entire downstairs of the Glassell.
My sound world is nestled in an alcove amongst a group of Jeff’s ceramic monoliths, scatted clay fragments, and reimagined remnants. It’s an environment to become immersed in, and evokes an altar site where earth and stone sing, sound, and whisper like an oracle of an unknown religion.
Jeff and I are from disparate artistic disciplines but we share common compositional frameworks: technical methods that intertwine with chance, indeterminacy, and happenstance, the repurposing of fragments, and an exploration of space, relationship, and dynamics. Our shared themes touch upon the drama of ritual spaces, envisioning and deconstructing possible futures at the edge of imagination.
My tracks for the installation feature many effected voice layers and synthesized sound worlds that intertwine in random ways across three stereo fields. The soundscape features many individual tracks that emanate from sound sources embedded with the sculptures and the sound ebbs and flows in random and unexpected ways.
Enjoy a version of the sound below.
These current offerings are part of a long-form conversation between clay and voice, matter and vibration, the artifact and the ephemeral—and prelude to our 2026 collaboration.
If you’re in Houston, Please join us at the reception this Friday September 5.
Misha of The Mishaverse