don’t be careful with me i’m normal at Signed and Numbered.

Deep in South Salt Lake, Signed & Numbered framing shop hosts one of NCECA’s 2025 ceramic exhibitions, don’t be careful with me i’m normal. The exhibition, boasting 22 pieces, lies across two rooms of the studio, where the rich scent of cut wood frames the atmosphere. “Care is a formative and (re)configuring force,” reads the exhibition extract. “Consider the unexplored brittle, self-conscious, and abrasive vestiges of care[giving/taking] alongside the presence of tenderness…”

Em Spakoski, “Hopscotch”

Em Spakoski’s “Hopscotch,” sitting upon a wood panel on the floor at the back of the exhibition, is a playful and cartoon-like work. Two figures are suspended in motion as they hop along a hopscotch path constructed from colorful, numbered tiles. “While working on this piece, I was reflecting on the nature of play within collaborative artistic relationships,” says Spakoski. Each participating artist in don’t be careful with me i’m normal selected another artist—someone who has shown them tenderness—to exhibit a piece alongside them. Spakoski was invited by Mayetta Steier, the pair finding their connection through the process of creating pieces in tandem. “I find that care is often communicated through play—lighthearted games invite gestures of tenderness and offer us a chance to escape the gravity of the everyday,” Spakoski says. “Hopscotch” sparks vivid memories of childlike play and elicits lighthearted emotions. Spakoski’s choice to play with proportion furthers the childlike, cartoonish energy, while her choice to suspend the characters in motion provides insight into their relationship with one another. The pair seem to dance along the path, chasing each other to the finish line. The fragility of the ceramic medium is on display, mirroring the momentary nature of the scene itself.

Steier’s “Buddy Cups in Salt Lake City” unmistakably sits in communication with Spakoski’s “Hopscotch.” Twelve mugs sit in pairs of two, one stacked over the other, in a neat row against a wall. Each mug has an arm, holding onto the neighboring mug’s handle like a barrel of monkeys. Their faces, adorned with a smile styled with clownlike features, exude a playfulness similar to “Hopscotch.” “Our work exists in the same universe with similar styles, sensibilities, and influences,” says Steier. “Buddy Cups in Salt Lake City” also presents a different facet, integral to the ceramic medium: utility. Each mug serves a distinct function while contributing to a unified relationship with the whole set.

Mayetta Steier, “Buddy Cups in Salt Lake City”

In “Body Massager,” by Gabby Gawreluk, the exhibition’s emphasis on relationships and nurturing takes a turn to the individual while presenting another utilitarian tool—intended not for interpersonal care, but self-care in. “My piece was created as a tool to take care of the human body…using this object is a way to show oneself mindfulness and care,” comments Gawreluk.  Ceramic is a compelling medium for this piece, as clay sourced from the earth provides a grounding effect, especially when paired with the massager’s earthy green glaze. Gawreluk invited artist Linda Christianson, who presents “Kitchen Bucket,” a pairing that is both minimal and utilitarian. The bucket, a basic vessel for domestic labor, is elevated through its ceramic form and glaze—functional yet thoughtfully rendered.

Relationships emerge in the exhibition even when the artists were not directly paired with each other. E.C. Comstock’s “Shot Peening Park” offers an abstract counterpoint to the utilitarian works of Gawreluk and Christianson: it appears as a cross between bodily forms and utensils, blurring the line between instruments to be used by the body and instruments of the body itself.

“Untitled (Moore)” by Kathryn Wingard veers further into abstraction, making the question of relationships and care more conceptual. It takes the form of a massive cube with a missing center. Upon closer inspection, the viewer finds the cube is made of thin and intricate ceramic rope, winding over itself. The longer one looks, the more the rope begins to transform, looking like muscle fibers, almost tissue-like in its construction. A relationship begins to form between the ceramic form and the pockets of air between its fibers, between the form itself and the space extending through its center, as if the air surrounding it is what suspends the piece in place. An intimate and tender union, between the work and the negative space that fills its gaps, forms, and a sense of fragility and vulnerability emerges.

The exhibition abstract rings true: “The lines between community, colleagues, friendship, and family are unclear within a medium that has a reputation for being uniquely close-knit.” Whether within the featured artists’ relationships or within the works themselves, don’t be careful with me i’m normal questions the nature of connection and relation, urging a reflection on who or what tends to you and how you tend to yourself.

don’t be careful with me i’m normal, Signed and Numbered, South Salt Lake, through March 29.

All images courtesy of the author.

Avery Greig

Avery Greig always has something to contribute. Whether lost in an art exhibition, meandering in downtown salt lake, or haunting a museum, she always has something to say when it comes to art. With her BA in Art History from the University of Utah, she loves sharing her passions for art and writing wrapped up in one.