British Ceramics Biennial 23/09/23
I was keen to visit the BCB but wanted to take the opportunity to listen to some of the artists talks being given by the 'Award' finalists. I booked myself onto talks by Carrie Reichardt, Mella Shaw and Elspeth Owen. I also really wanted to see the pieces by Rebecca Appleby as I had only seen these as works in progress at her studio and online. I am not going to talk about the whole show, but will focus on the highlights and points of interest for me.
What struck me first was that the main exhibition areas were located far from the centre of stoke, in Hanley, the exhibitions were across two sites within a couple of metres of each other. The main building was All Saints Church with the remainder of the works displayed in the nearby church hall. It would seem that funding for the event and perhaps even local council interest in the event as a whole had led to its location and to a somewhat low key vibe to the whole show. I am aware that in previous years the BCB had been held in Spode China Hal which would seem a much more fitting venue, sadly this building is no longer considered safe and there seems to be no plans to renovate and reignite this space except by the thriving rave culture in stoke.
What struck me first was that the main exhibition areas were located far from the centre of stoke, in Hanley, the exhibitions were across two sites within a couple of metres of each other. The main building was All Saints Church with the remainder of the works displayed in the nearby church hall. It would seem that funding for the event and perhaps even local council interest in the event as a whole had led to its location and to a somewhat low key vibe to the whole show. I am aware that in previous years the BCB had been held in Spode China Hal which would seem a much more fitting venue, sadly this building is no longer considered safe and there seems to be no plans to renovate and reignite this space except by the thriving rave culture in stoke.
Elspeth Owens work was an installation piece about time, decay, impermanency and transformation, her installation was a call out of pottery shards from around the globe, collated and piled into a long mound in the garden at the back of the church. On top of the shards lay a row of low bisque fired tiny pinch pot bowls. These small vessels were made to react to the exposure to the weather and remained outside for the duration of the event where visitors where invited to remove them on the last day. Her talk was a performative narrative about her life as a maker, about change and transformation, Owens is 84 years old and was reflecting the changes she was making both to her work and how she was choosing to practice. It was a very interesting at experience and there was a calm, contemplative, meditative sense to the whole piece, she was as much part of this work as the objects themselves.
Below are some images of her piece.
Below are some images of her piece.
I was keen to see Rebecca Appleby's work, I love her ethos as a maker and she has been very kind and supportive to me so I was excited to see the pieces she had been working on.
I thought the pieces were very interesting, organic looking spheres with very complex textured surfaces, but sadly I felt that they were poorly curated, the placement and location of the pieces in the venue really let them down. There were too many pieces, standing too close together with insufficient light to really enable them to be fully appreciated. It was hard to stand back and look at them and they were partly obscured by the heavy, dark wood surroundings of the church that mainly relied on window light, because the building is a cavernous dark space, any directional lighting became lost and I felt that this impacted on the overall look of her work.
Below are images that I took of her pieces.
I thought the pieces were very interesting, organic looking spheres with very complex textured surfaces, but sadly I felt that they were poorly curated, the placement and location of the pieces in the venue really let them down. There were too many pieces, standing too close together with insufficient light to really enable them to be fully appreciated. It was hard to stand back and look at them and they were partly obscured by the heavy, dark wood surroundings of the church that mainly relied on window light, because the building is a cavernous dark space, any directional lighting became lost and I felt that this impacted on the overall look of her work.
Below are images that I took of her pieces.
"Boundary End by Nicola Tassie comprises 60 individual thrown ceramic forms tightly arranged together. It questions the ideas of the spaces we inhabit and the boundaries that are enforced on people and communities."
https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/exhibitions/award/
Nicola Tassie's work was really fascinating, I love the idea of transforming the mechanically formed wheel thrown cylinder into an organic form, slotting many wheel thrown components together to form a 'wall' of strange looking vessels. Again I think there were problems with how it was sited, it was a low piece and hard to see properly and looked tiny in the setting despite the number of vessels, it felt like it was competing hard with the space it was in set against grand granite carved pillars, wood panelling and stained glass windows.
Below are some images of the work
https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/exhibitions/award/
Nicola Tassie's work was really fascinating, I love the idea of transforming the mechanically formed wheel thrown cylinder into an organic form, slotting many wheel thrown components together to form a 'wall' of strange looking vessels. Again I think there were problems with how it was sited, it was a low piece and hard to see properly and looked tiny in the setting despite the number of vessels, it felt like it was competing hard with the space it was in set against grand granite carved pillars, wood panelling and stained glass windows.
Below are some images of the work
Mella Shaw - Sounding Line
Sounding Line by Mella Shaw focuses on the overuse of marine sonar which is having a devastating effect on deep-diving whale species that rely on echolocation (a biological sonar used by several animal species). She has created large-scale sculptural forms inspired by the whales’ tiny inner ear bones.
https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/exhibitions/award/
I was blown away both by the artist and the complexity and sophistication of this piece. It's an installation of large stoneware cloud/bone type sculptures bound with heavy red cotton rope. The stoneware is mixed with whale bone and some have markings on the surface. Some pieces are suspended on a heavy scaffold framework with vibrating devices attached to the ends of the ropes that send a vibration through the rope down to the sculptural pieces. The aim is to give the viewer a sense of what whales experience from the sonar sounds emitted by submarines and ships that are scouting the oceans for oil.
Accompanying the installation is a video performance of Shaw dragging one of the unfired sculptures across the beach and back to the ocean where it breaks down amongst the waves returning the material back to the earth.
The whole piece is complex and sophisticated, with many layers, there is a strong ecological narrative that puts the viewer right in the centre of the issue of whale deaths from beaching as a consequence of over use of sonar, this is immediately evocative, you see it and feel it in the space. The sculptures themselves are beautifully refined and tactile and the performance demonstrates the level of the artists commitment to the work and the importance of research and depth to creating this work as a whole.
Unsurprisingly Ella Shaw was the winner of the Award prize and will be a featured artists at the next biennial in 2025.
Below are images of her work.
Sounding Line by Mella Shaw focuses on the overuse of marine sonar which is having a devastating effect on deep-diving whale species that rely on echolocation (a biological sonar used by several animal species). She has created large-scale sculptural forms inspired by the whales’ tiny inner ear bones.
https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/exhibitions/award/
I was blown away both by the artist and the complexity and sophistication of this piece. It's an installation of large stoneware cloud/bone type sculptures bound with heavy red cotton rope. The stoneware is mixed with whale bone and some have markings on the surface. Some pieces are suspended on a heavy scaffold framework with vibrating devices attached to the ends of the ropes that send a vibration through the rope down to the sculptural pieces. The aim is to give the viewer a sense of what whales experience from the sonar sounds emitted by submarines and ships that are scouting the oceans for oil.
Accompanying the installation is a video performance of Shaw dragging one of the unfired sculptures across the beach and back to the ocean where it breaks down amongst the waves returning the material back to the earth.
The whole piece is complex and sophisticated, with many layers, there is a strong ecological narrative that puts the viewer right in the centre of the issue of whale deaths from beaching as a consequence of over use of sonar, this is immediately evocative, you see it and feel it in the space. The sculptures themselves are beautifully refined and tactile and the performance demonstrates the level of the artists commitment to the work and the importance of research and depth to creating this work as a whole.
Unsurprisingly Ella Shaw was the winner of the Award prize and will be a featured artists at the next biennial in 2025.
Below are images of her work.
Strange Clay January 2023
This was the first ceramics specific exhibition I had gone to London specifically to see, I really wanted to see the work in this show because my research for my first assignment had left me wondering about where ceramics actually fits within the fine art/contemporary craft continuum. The answer I found from seeing this show was a resounding Fine Art context, everything had sophisticated and complex narratives. Materiality was a strong part of a number of works, there was also humour, religious and political themes as well as some challenging works where construction and quality of workmanship was hard to ignore and there were some pieces that in my personal opinion were downright ugly!
The highlights for me where the porcelain installation pieces by Rachel Kneebone, her narrative pieces express the connections between nature and the body and despite the purity of the whiteness there is a visceral quality to the work which is very striking.
Salvatore Arancio’s strangely surreal works look like an alien has landed in the exhibition space and laid some weird eggs or pods that are bursting out from the rock face. There is something fantastical about the pieces, a sci-fi Ernst Haeckel type of sculpture that wouldn’t look out of place in a sci-fi comic book.
I enjoyed looking at the forms of Ken Prices sculptures, they have a very organic quality but I found the metallic, painterly finishes and the colours used too distracting and busy like one was competing with the other.
David Zink Yi put a giant squid on the floor of the gallery, it grabbed loads of attention and was very striking but the very best work for me was Lindsey Mendick’s installation, it was just fabulous. Funny, dark and relatable, her work uses humour to deal with her own and many of our own deepest fears and anxieties, a snail chariot pulled by white mice, an octopus in the toilet and slugs getting drunk on beer, the detail is fantastic.
Below are some pics I took of the exhibition.
This was the first ceramics specific exhibition I had gone to London specifically to see, I really wanted to see the work in this show because my research for my first assignment had left me wondering about where ceramics actually fits within the fine art/contemporary craft continuum. The answer I found from seeing this show was a resounding Fine Art context, everything had sophisticated and complex narratives. Materiality was a strong part of a number of works, there was also humour, religious and political themes as well as some challenging works where construction and quality of workmanship was hard to ignore and there were some pieces that in my personal opinion were downright ugly!
The highlights for me where the porcelain installation pieces by Rachel Kneebone, her narrative pieces express the connections between nature and the body and despite the purity of the whiteness there is a visceral quality to the work which is very striking.
Salvatore Arancio’s strangely surreal works look like an alien has landed in the exhibition space and laid some weird eggs or pods that are bursting out from the rock face. There is something fantastical about the pieces, a sci-fi Ernst Haeckel type of sculpture that wouldn’t look out of place in a sci-fi comic book.
I enjoyed looking at the forms of Ken Prices sculptures, they have a very organic quality but I found the metallic, painterly finishes and the colours used too distracting and busy like one was competing with the other.
David Zink Yi put a giant squid on the floor of the gallery, it grabbed loads of attention and was very striking but the very best work for me was Lindsey Mendick’s installation, it was just fabulous. Funny, dark and relatable, her work uses humour to deal with her own and many of our own deepest fears and anxieties, a snail chariot pulled by white mice, an octopus in the toilet and slugs getting drunk on beer, the detail is fantastic.
Below are some pics I took of the exhibition.
York Art Gallery May 2023
My first visit to this gallery and there were so many amazing ceramics to see, the wall of women celebrating a history of phenomenal female ceramic artists, the Yorkshire Tea Ceremony collection which showcases the collection of ceramics bequeathed by Bill Ismay to the gallery and the temporary exhibition showing a huge range of piece’s by the late Gordon Baldwin. It was absolutely fab and I found the work of Baldwin so inspiring, his forms are seemingly simple but the construction, use of colour and marks as well as the narratives behind his pieces are fascinating and complex.
Below are some of the works I took photographs of during my visit.
My first visit to this gallery and there were so many amazing ceramics to see, the wall of women celebrating a history of phenomenal female ceramic artists, the Yorkshire Tea Ceremony collection which showcases the collection of ceramics bequeathed by Bill Ismay to the gallery and the temporary exhibition showing a huge range of piece’s by the late Gordon Baldwin. It was absolutely fab and I found the work of Baldwin so inspiring, his forms are seemingly simple but the construction, use of colour and marks as well as the narratives behind his pieces are fascinating and complex.
Below are some of the works I took photographs of during my visit.
International Ceramics Festival 30/06/2023
This was the first ceramic festival I had ever been too, it was a brilliant experience, such a great variety of things to see, do and watch and a chance to mix with fellow ceramic artists and potters, everyone there wanted to chat about pots, it was great!
There were wood firings, lots of different demonstrations, lectures and presentations and a chance to talk to key speakers and artists about their practice. I thoroughly enjoyed the lecture by Greek artist Theodora Chorafas, she combines performance, sculpture and functional pieces into her ceramic practice. Her approach is gentle, purposeful and spiritual, with a desire to reconnect body and mind to the earth, her works are a combination of intricate sculptural pieces sometimes incorporating animal bones or larger delicate forms that work more as an installation. I loved how she spoke about her practice and how it is deeply enmeshed in her life and the place where she lives.
I was fascinated by the weirdly organic plant/alien like sculptures made by Canadian artist Toni Losey, her work is made on the potters wheel and she assembles different rounded pieces together to create these strange forms, she then decorates the surface with several layers of underglaze and glaze that she sprays on and fires repeatedly to create some depth and texture in the surface.
I also really enjoyed the demonstration and lecture by Sharon Griffin, there is a rawness and deep emotional relationship between Sharon and her work, her honesty about her life and where her thoughts and ideas come from was both emotionally evocative and striking and relatable to many people but I feel especially women. There was something both reassuring and brave about how she approaches her practice, on first encounter it may seem chaotic and purely intuitively driven, but there is a complex and sophisticated depth of research that both informs and inspires her work, she uses sketch boks both as a way to jot down thoughts and ideas but also as a journal and I found this very interesting, she is very open about the content and they are available to look through at her shows and events.
It was great to see people who really love the alchemy and excitement of different types of firing, wood firers were seen darting in and out to check the progress and top up the ovens and the raku performance witha giant dragon was full of drama, the whole weekend was very fun, busy and I learned so much.
This was the first ceramic festival I had ever been too, it was a brilliant experience, such a great variety of things to see, do and watch and a chance to mix with fellow ceramic artists and potters, everyone there wanted to chat about pots, it was great!
There were wood firings, lots of different demonstrations, lectures and presentations and a chance to talk to key speakers and artists about their practice. I thoroughly enjoyed the lecture by Greek artist Theodora Chorafas, she combines performance, sculpture and functional pieces into her ceramic practice. Her approach is gentle, purposeful and spiritual, with a desire to reconnect body and mind to the earth, her works are a combination of intricate sculptural pieces sometimes incorporating animal bones or larger delicate forms that work more as an installation. I loved how she spoke about her practice and how it is deeply enmeshed in her life and the place where she lives.
I was fascinated by the weirdly organic plant/alien like sculptures made by Canadian artist Toni Losey, her work is made on the potters wheel and she assembles different rounded pieces together to create these strange forms, she then decorates the surface with several layers of underglaze and glaze that she sprays on and fires repeatedly to create some depth and texture in the surface.
I also really enjoyed the demonstration and lecture by Sharon Griffin, there is a rawness and deep emotional relationship between Sharon and her work, her honesty about her life and where her thoughts and ideas come from was both emotionally evocative and striking and relatable to many people but I feel especially women. There was something both reassuring and brave about how she approaches her practice, on first encounter it may seem chaotic and purely intuitively driven, but there is a complex and sophisticated depth of research that both informs and inspires her work, she uses sketch boks both as a way to jot down thoughts and ideas but also as a journal and I found this very interesting, she is very open about the content and they are available to look through at her shows and events.
It was great to see people who really love the alchemy and excitement of different types of firing, wood firers were seen darting in and out to check the progress and top up the ovens and the raku performance witha giant dragon was full of drama, the whole weekend was very fun, busy and I learned so much.