Monthly Archives: July 2009
Ceramicist’s work I love
There are so many to mention but here are my top 5…
In 2004 I went to work with Kate Malone at Balls Pond Studio in Islington, London. How was I lucky enough to do this, might you ask? Well I was at college at the time and had always been an admirer of Kate’s work. One day whilst focusing on my research I decided to send Kate an e-mail from her website. I explained that I was a student specialising in Ceramics and wondered if she would be kind enough to help me with a few questions. I remember literally sending her a long list, including questions like “Can you explain your typical way of working from a day to day basis?”… and sure enough she replied giving full lengthy answers to all of my questions, even explaining how she juggles her life in London with her other home in the South of France, taking her daughter to school etc. She asked if I would be interested in visiting her studio for the day in the summer, to help her with a large commissioned project! I felt as though Christmas had come early when she had replied to my e-mail, so you can imagine how I felt when she asked that!
When I’d arranged to go down and stay in London, Kate was working on a commission for the Children’s Library in Bristol. She had made hundreds of these big ‘sprigs’ that were going to be displayed on the wall in the library, in shapes of dice, snails, skittles, balls, sweets etc, (Can’t find any images of it online but I know there are somewhere!), and as she glazed each one she then passed them to me to wipe off any excess glaze that had dribbled onto the bottom. I was basically her slave for the day, but couldn’t have wished to be anything more! I loved every minute of it – seeing the environment she worked in, exploring her studio, having an insight into an internationally famous ceramicist’s work place and how she did things. It was very inspirational.
Kate Malone’s work is all inspired by her travels around the world. Her book ‘A Book of Pots‘ (which my copy has her signiture in!!), is absolutely fascinating and I would really reccommend reading it.
What I love about Kate’s work are the wacky glazes and quirkiness to her fruit and sea inspired pots. One of my favourites are her huge pineapple pots. One of which ‘Queen Pineapple‘ is on display at Manchester City Art Galleries.
Next up is Cathy Fleckstein, a German ceramic artist making large wall pieces with built up layers of coloured decorating slips and engraved marks on the surface. She also makes other forms with similar decoration. I love the way she builds up the texture and appearance of surface, as this is similar to the way I work.
Don’t you just love these hand-thrown jugs by Kyra Cane? Her work is often very delicate and subtle, with brushmarks fading and blurring, and inky opaque bands of colour changing to pale fresh air blues. See Kyra Cane’s forms at The Bircham Gallery, they are soothing yet so powerful!
I love the drawings Kyra creates, which influence the surfaces of her ceramics. The marks built up on paper in different materials reminds me of the process and techniques of Cathy Fleckstein’s work above. There are some great articles written on Kyra Cane’s work here, have a read!
Jim Robison is next on the list, with his amazing collection of handmade studio ceramics at Booth House Gallery, Yorkshire. I admire his large scale works and really love the way each piece is made. Individual slab pieces are created through a process which includes using an antique mangle to roll and re-roll prepared sheets of clay . This creates broken edges and areas which are stretched and stressed, generating their own feeling of history. Slips, which are painted, combed, sponge printed and stencilled provide contrasting colours and these are emphasised by applications of up to six glazes and the firing in the reduction atmosphere of a large gas kiln.
I found this interesting quote by Jim Robison about his work: “Process refers to both the act of making (what happens during the manipulation of clay, slip, and glaze always with one eye on the possible effects of firing!) and an awareness of the passage of time, Changes that occur with events of nature and history.“
Lastly let me introduce you to Ewen Henderson, who I think may be my biggest inspiration of all. My work relates to Ewen’s is many ways, such as the overall organic, rustic and natural look, the slab built process, and the form of each piece. Looking at these images has made me want to get back into the swing of hand building more sculptural vessels. I’ve always liked the fact that Ewen always pushed the boundaries with his work, he never really stuck to ‘the rules’, and created some beautiful works by exploring the material in his own way.
Sadly Ewen Henderson passed away in 2000, but his ceramics still remains well known and will always be an inspiration.
Hope you like this collection, feel free to leave comments and let me knw what you think! Which work do you like best?
Sculpture in the Sanctuary Exhibition
After driving down to Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire at the weekend to collect my ‘family of 3′ organic garden sculptures from Showborough House where they were on exhibition in the garden from April to June, they have now been cleaned and packaged up ready to be collected again tomorrow. My sculptures are going to be exhibited at an exhibition in Nottingham called Sculpture in the Sanctuary, from August 7th – 31st 2009. The exhibition will take place within a 15 acre swan sanctuary that features 5 lakes and gladed open areas.
I’m really excited to see them displayed at a new venue and amongst other exterior sculptures made by many different artists/sculptors in a whole range of materials. Click here to view a list of all other participating sculptors to get an idea of the work that will be on show.
An idea that is said to be taking place at this event is for the visitors of the park to fix their own piece of some sort of material to a huge wall covered with metal wire, so that a brand new sculpture is made by all visitors.
Other exciting news: We bought a Nintendo Wii at the weekend! Been playing Wii Fit, although its not such a good idea when theres lots of making to be done! But it does keep you fit 
I have also just been commissioned by a customer to design and make a sculptural vessel for her 8th wedding anniversary gift to her husband. It’s going to have some of the words from the song they danced to at their wedding, as well as lines from a poem he wrote in her first valentines card. Colour scheme needs to be cream, olive green and blue. I’ve never worked on anything so personalised like this before, but I’m really excited about it! Will show you the results when its finished.
Seaside break
I had a lovely relaxing and fun weekend away at the seaside, wish I was still there! The weather was warm and mostly sunny in Skegness where we stayed, so it was nice to be on the beach and I loved feeling the sand inbetween my toes!
We spend most of the time at the Fantasy Island area where there was a theme park and a big market. I was excited about looking round the market after reading on the website: “Come and get lost in our maze of colourful stalls!”, and thats exactly what we did! There were lots of bars and restaurants to choose from, and lots to do and see. One of my highlights was visiting the Skegness Nature Land centre, where we saw baby and adult seals, as well as poorly seals on the mend in the seal hospital that had been rescued from local beaches. We watched them being fed and they did some tricks. The baby seals were sooo cute, I want to keep one!!
Also at the Nature Land centre we visited the tropical house, floral palace, and butterfly farm. The colours and patterns on some of the butterflies were gorgeous, and some were as big as your hand span. I was lucky enough to have one butterfly in particular keep landing on me, although I think it was my purfume it was attracted to!
Whilst on the beach I found this interesting collection of shells and pebbles. I wanted to do something with them but wasn’t quite sure what, until I found an idea by Lauren Ceramics to sort them out in order of size and then frame them. Click here to view Lauren’s post about her shell collection. Isn’t it great? I can’t wait to arrange mine into a display.
For those of you who read my blog regularly you will know that I have recently got a new workshop. Well here’s the plaque I made which is now hanging on the outside next to the door. I’m really pleased with it, just need to get back in there and start making lots of new work! I’ve got a lot of stock to build up ready for my next show at the International Bristol Balloon Fiesta in August, and also for my Open Studios exhibition at The Evergreen Gallery in September.
Recent work and Sale
It’s so exciting opening the kiln to see bursts of colour and shiny glazes! I’m really pleased with my new range of bowls. A lot of them have coloured glass melted in the bottom which makes them look quite eye catching. I decided to photograph these bowls all together like this, to save uploading individual photos which was rather lazy of me! I do have some much better images of each individual bowl on my Facebook Group - feel free to have a look, and you can also join my group if you like
Also quite new to my range, I have been working on these ceramic wall plaques with funny phrases engraved into the surface. These are popular at craft fairs and people always stop, read and laugh! Just a few examples are: “A lovely lady and a grumpy old man live here”, “Wine improves with age, the older I get the more I like it”, “Welcome to chaos”, “Grandma’s are antique little girls”, “I’m usually thin and gorgeous, but today is my day off!”.
I also do some homely ones such as Welcome signs, “Enter with a happy heart”, and “Live, Laugh, Love”.
After spending some time photographing my new batch of work I decided to update my Folksy shop with a bit of colour as it was full of earthy browns and natural colours, and it is now summer after all! I was so chuffed to find out I had sold a new bowl later that evening, with it only being listed for sale a few hours. It was one of my faves, as I said goodbye to it I took this photo!
Impulse buy!
I was mooching through some of my favourite shops on Folksy today, and couldn’t resist buying this stunning “Summer Mobile Phone Sock”, handmade by Tamsyn G. Can’t wait for it to arrive, my phone is going to look nice and cosy! Although it won’t really need it in this hot weather.
What do you buy on impulse that you can’t resist??
Peterborough Town & Country Show results
I had a stall at the Peterborough Town & Country show at the weekend, 4th & 5th July. The show was held alongside the river in Embankment, and for its first opening year seemed to attract hundreds of visitors. The hot weather was an added bonus, although it did tip down for about 20 mins on Sunday, resulting in the marquees being absolutely packed!
I had a great time and met lots of lovely people, including other stall holders. I also managed to give out my Open Studios brochures, so was pleased about that. A lady from Peterborough Open Studios approached me and asked if I would join them, so thats something to think about for next year as I’m busy with Northamptonshire Open Studios this year.
Camping was fun! We were allowed to pitch our tent directly behind the marquee, so ‘home’ for the night was only a few metres away. Our cool box didn’t stay very cool – We had to go to a local supermarket for some ice cubes and also bought some frozen sausages for breakfast, which kept the drinks cold throughout the night!
I was pleased with the layout of my stall. Like before I was situated next to the entrance of the marquee so I could welcome people in.
This event was organised by Oakleigh Fairs. I would definitely recommend them – very hard working and could not fault them. I’m doing another show with them in August at the International Bristol Balloon Fiesta over 4 days which I’m really excited about!
Joined Twitter today
Is anyone else on Twitter?
I don’t know what possessed me to join as I’ve never really been bothered about it til now, and now I think I’m addicted! I’ve customised my page to look similar to my blog, all I need now is Twittering followers! Follow me if you are interested
