Known for incorporating everyday consumer objects into his work, An Te Liu began rethinking the use of ready-made materials in his sculptures and installations while an artist-in-residence at Toronto’s Gardiner Museum for ceramic arts in 2013. Carving free-form into the Styrofoam packaging of everything from iMac screens to rice cookers, Liu created the molds for a series of innovative glazed and fired clay sculptures grouped together as MONO NO MA. The title references the Japanese word mono (“thing”) and ma (a “space” or “gap”). Front and centre on the low white plinth is Aphros, meaning “foam” in Greek.