Alexandra Standen’s work explores our relationships to both physical and emotional spaces. Her work focuses on the subjective, cultural, and ideological meanings of material objects, examining the way objects and their relationships act as metaphors for human behaviour. Her practice also speaks to the process of making work in ceramic and a sense of unease that comes with engaging with a medium that holds a functional quality yet has a connotation of being fragile or precarious in nature. The repetitive gesture of ‘pinching’ her hand-built forms is as much conceptual as it is an act of realisation. In 2019 Standen was the recipient of the prestigious Cité Internationale des Arts Residency in Paris and undertook self-guided research living in Istanbul. Winner of the Sidney Myer Award for Ceramics, Shepparton Art Museum 2012, Standen was a finalist in awards including the Churchie National Emerging Art Prize, Gold Coast Ceramic Award and the Wynne Prize. She has undertaken residencies in Geneva, Tel Aviv, and at the Harley Foundation in the United Kingdom.