Quiet Cartographies by Terry Fromm

Vessel/Sculpture

Enamel, Gold Leaf and Sgraffito on Formed Copper

Sgraffito, painting, sifting

5.5 x 1 Inches

Quiet Cartographies is a series of small enameled copper vessels that explores the language of natural systems through line, color, and form. Created using the sgraffito technique, each bowl carries a network of marks that suggest waterways, roots, geological strata, or cellular structures. These images are not illustrations of specific places but reflections on the patterns that connect living and physical landscapes.
The intimate scale encourages close observation, inviting viewers to move between seeing the vessels as containers and as imagined terrains. Layers of translucent enamel create subtle shifts of light and depth, while the drawn lines trace paths of growth, movement, and change.
Together, the vessels function as quiet studies of connection and transformation, revealing how similar structures emerge across vastly different scales of the natural world—from microscopic forms to expansive landscapes.