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Famous british potters


15 British ceramic artists you should know

Crafts CouncilStories

ByIsabella Smith

11 September 2020

The most important UK potters of the 20th century

Isabella Smith

11 September 2020

Ceramic art flourished in Britain during the 20th century, changing the face of clay forever. Pioneering potters began to work independently, using an ancient craft to create cutting-edge art and design. Here’s our pick of the UK’s top ceramic artists from the century – some of whom are still alive and making – that we think you should know.

Fluted bowl by Bernard Leach, porcelain with Ying Ch'ing glaze, 1960-65. Photo: Crafts Council Collection P6

Bernard Leach (1887–1979)

Often called ‘the father of British studio pottery’, Bernard Leach sought to unify the ceramic heritage of East and West, making rustic wares inspired by folk traditions. After studying in Japan, in 1920 he founded the Leach Pottery in St Ives; it continues to thrive today.

Magdalene Odundo (b. 1950)

Rising to fame in the 1980s – and still very much an active maker today – the Kenyan-born potter Magdalene Odundo is renowned for her burnished black and ochre vessels, which are hand-built through a slow coiling process. These are inspired by a wide array of influences, ranging from ancient Cycladic sculptures to the human body.

Bowl by Lucie Rie, thrown from porcelain with uranium yellow glaze, 1971. Photo: Crafts Council Collection P107

Lucie Rie (1902–1995)

The Jewish potter Lucie Rie fled Nazi Austria in 1938, finding shelter in London, where she established her own pottery. Rie’s elegant modernist designs have always been in demand – her colourful vases and bowls now sell for record-breaking prices.

Swimming Geese, William Staite Murray, thrown bowl with iron oxide brushwork, 1933. Photo: York Museums Trust Staff

William Staite Murray (1881–1962)

William Staite Murray wanted pots to be seen as fine art: abstract sculpture rather than tableware. For this reason, his Sung Dynasty-inspired ceramics all have individual titles, and were shown alongside work by 1930s painters and sculptors such as Ben Nicholson and Christopher Wood.

Pot, Hans Coper, oxidised stoneware, 1972. Photo: Stokes Photo Ltd / Crafts Council Collection: P36

Hans Coper (1920–1981)

Hans Coper escaped Nazi Germany in 1939 and settled in London, where he worked with friend and fellow refugee Lucie Rie. Coper’s textured stoneware works combine sculpture with functionality – one famous example are the seven foot-high candlesticks commissioned for Coventry Cathedral in 1962.

Dish by Michael Cardew, stoneware with brushed decoration in the form of a bird, 1976. Photo: Crafts Council Collection P77

Michael Cardew (1901–1983)

The first potter to apprentice at the Leach Pottery in St Ives, Michael Cardew became famous for his slipware pots decorated with birds, fish and abstract designs. Cardew worked in West Africa for over 20 years, where he was an influential ceramics teacher and writer.

Emmanuel Cooper (1938–2012)

Known for his vividly coloured and textured tableware, Emmanuel Cooper pioneered new ways for urban potters to work in the 1970s, exploring the creative possibilities of electric kilns. Alongside his pottery, he was an influential teacher, author, editor and LGBTQ+ activist.

Painting in the Form of a Bowl, Gordon Baldwin, coiled and slabbed buff clay with engobes, oxides and stains, 1984. Photo: Stokes Photo Ltd / Crafts Council Collection: P349

Gordon Baldwin (b. 1932)

How can you combine painting with ceramics? It’s a question that Gordon Baldwin has spent much of his 50-year career exploring. The ceramic artist is best known for his hand-built sculptural forms coated in slip, which serve as a canvas for abstract brushwork.

Big Green Jug, Alison Britton, 1979, slab-built earthenware with stains and underglaze. Photo: Stokes Photo Ltd. / Crafts Council Collection P235

Alison Britton (b. 1948)

One of the ground-breaking ceramic artists who emerged from London’s Royal College of Art in the 1970s, Alison Britton rose to fame with her playful post-modern pottery. Her slab-built vessels, covered in painterly pours and marks, often toy with the notion of functionality in tableware.

Square Dish, Siddig El Nigoumi, burnished terracotta with an incised design, 1985. Photo: courtesy Maak Ceramics

Siddig el Nigoumi (1931-1996)

The Sudanese potter Siddig el Nigoumi spent most of his life in Britain, where he lived from 1967. His burnished terracotta earthenware combines European and African influences, featuring stylised designs delicately scratched into his coiled pots.

Tail of the Dog, Gillian Lowndes, fibreglass tissue, porcelain slip, wire, Egyptian paste, granite, 1983 Photo: John Hammond / Crafts Council Collection: P324

Gillian Lowndes (1936–2010)

What happens when you fire clay with forks, bricks, bulldog clips, or even loofahs? From the 1960s onwards, Gillian Lowndes spent decades discovering the creative possibilities of mixed media – marking a radical departure from traditional notions of ceramic art.

Teapot with Lid, Richard Batterham, salt-glazed stoneware, 1984. Photo: Stokes Photo Ltd. / Crafts Council Collection: P354

Richard Batterham (b. 1936)

One of the last surviving potters to have apprenticed with Bernard Leach, Richard Batterham has spent more than 60 years making quiet, eminently functional stoneware pots. Made from clay he has processed himself and his own wood-ash glazes, Batterham’s tableware is wood-fired in his rural Dorset pottery.

Fruit Bowl, Richard Slee, 1982, hand-built and slabbed clays with sprayed underglaze. Photo: Relic Imaging Ltd. / Crafts Council Collection: P313

Richard Slee (b. 1946)

Dubbed the 'Grand Wizard of Studio Ceramics', Richard Slee rose to fame in the 1980s with his witty, post-modern sculptures. Combining humour with subversion, Slee’s glossily glazed earthenware artworks reference everything from Disney cartoons to Pop Art.

James Tower (1919-88)

Although well-known among artists, James Tower was an overlooked figure – until recent exhibitions and auctions brought him to wider attention. Tower’s press-moulded bowls, chargers and vessels are adorned with sketch-like sgraffito marks scratched through his monochrome tin glazes.

Tea Bowl, Ewen Henderson, handbuilt stoneware laminated with bone china and porcelain, 1986. Photo: Crafts Council Collection: P381

Ewen Henderson (1934–2000)

Describing himself as an ‘artist in fluxed earth’, Ewen Henderson earned attention from the 1970s onwards for his pitted, volcanic vessels and sculptures. Henderson’s heavily textured forms were created by hand-building a patchwork of different clays together.

5 British ceramicists you should know about | London Evening Standard

Roam the halls of Liberty, window shop down Lamb Conduit’s Street, snoop into the front rooms of Islington’s townhouses and you’re bound to see beautiful ceramic pot after beautiful ceramic pot.

Yes: the clay craze is still reigning hard.

With a rise of new potters, it is just one of the many crafts thriving in the British art scene right now. Its success as a medium is not just because of its aesthetic but also because it's typically much more affordable than other forms of sculpture. If you’re a student you can pick up a one-off vase for £15, if you’re a banker you can invest in an Edmund de Waal.

Right now there’s really is no end of British makers to invest your money into. Here are some of our favourites…

Skratch Ceramics

Read more

London's top cult design shops and best independent art galleries

Made in South Wales, these handmade, hand-etched ceramics are the stuff of folk art dreams. All the products are made in signature colourways - blue and white or navy and white - and feature the images of lone figures or village scenes.

Using the technique of sgraffito, which in Italian means the act of carving into the top of hardened clay, each of Kate Russell’s pieces are truly one of a kind - lumps, bumps and all.

Limehouse Ceramics

A former management consultant, Elizabeth Macneal traded the city for a clay studio in 2016 and Limehouse Ceramics was born.

Today, still a one-women business, MacNeal makes each of her pieces in her small studio at the bottom of her garden. Simple and practical, she takes much of her inspiration from Japanese and Scandinavian pottery and adds her own stamp to each design by mixing up the type of clay and glazes she uses.

Also an author, Elizabeth's debut novel, The Doll Factory, will be published as Picador's lead debut in 2019.

Georgie Sampson Pottery

Made from her farm in Scotland, Georgie Sampson throws her pots in her barn-cum-studio. Using a mixed palette that reflect the Celtic landscapes of Scotland and Ireland (she often spends time in Donegal) the glazing on her work is what really steals the show. The pieces are sometimes colourful, sometimes moody but always atmospheric.

John Booth

John Booth’s vases are hard to find. The artist, who once wrote all over Fendi’s designs (with permission and a contract), is known primarily as an illustrator but also produces a range of ceramics.

Colourful, kind of Matisse-y, kind of Picasso-y, a little bit Chagall-y - the vases are released from time to time and get snapped up almost instantly. If you are lucky enough to get one, hold on tight. With the fashion crowd's approval already secure, it’s likely a ‘John Booth’ will certainly become collector’s item in no time.

Tom Kemp

Tom Kemp specialises in porcelain work and primarily makes (extremely beautiful) curved vases.

His work is instantly recognisable by the calligraphic brush strokes he paints across the glaze. Definitely not a practical purchase, these pots are made to sit in all their glory on a dresser making the room come together by doing absolutely nothing at all.

20 artists who shape the future of ceramics

Modern Russian ceramic artists are poorly represented in US galleries and museums. In order to get to the exhibition of modern art ceramics and be noticed by experts, you need to exhibit your work on electronic portals and Internet resources. There are six major information platforms in the US where ceramic artists post their work. One of them is Artsy. We have translated for you one of the articles of this resource, dated February 22, 2017. It should be noted that even now, foreign trends are still relevant for the study and formation of the future of Russian artistic ceramics.

Ceramic artists and artisans have always contributed to the art world for centuries. From prehistoric pottery to ancient Greek amphorae, from the rise of porcelain in Asia and Europe to arts and crafts in England and the United States. Ceramic traditions have long fascinated artists and permeated their practice. In today's art world, this became especially clear in 2015, when ceramics may have peaked in popularity.

This year's Whitney Biennale honored the ceramics of Sterling Rubin and Shio Kusaka. The De Purys curated exhibitions by leading ceramic artists at Venus Over Manhattan. At major fairs such as Frieze and Art Basel, gallerists highlighted displays featuring Dan McCarthy and Takuro Kuwata's ceramics and Rachel Klin and Clara Kristalova's clay sculptures. It is in this context that older artists who have long championed traditional pottery, Betty Woodman, Ken Price, Arlene Shechet, and Ron Nagle, have seen a resurgence. And young artists such as Jessie Wine, Rose Acken, Elizabeth Jaeger, and Jenny Jian Lee have entered the mainstream. Although the trend has somewhat decreased, the enthusiasm for ceramics remains strong, and artists working in the field of ceramics and clay continue to occupy a stable position in the art world.

"Pottery is a medium that becomes easier for beginners every decade - more unbridled, versatile and demystified, and perhaps more and more deserving of its own place in the wider history of sculpture," says British ceramist Aaron Angel, who founded in 2014 pottery studio in London to train his followers. “I think clay work deserves more than just being a craft that is tangentially mentioned in the art world,” he adds.

And he is by no means alone. Countless artists today are redefining the perception of ceramics, ensuring that whether it is a functional vessel or an explosive sculpture, the art form receives its due respect and recognition. Below we highlight the work of 20 ceramic artists as they each share why they are passionate about clay.

Bruce M. Sherman
New York 1942 • Lives and works in New York

Bruce Sherman.
Woman with fish. 2016

Bruce Sherman.
One eye; Lots of eyes. 2016

“By turning to clay, the artist and the viewer are communicating with other works that have been made and have been around for hundreds and thousands of years,” says Sherman, who turned to ceramics after leaving dentistry. "I work in improv mode, and each new piece of clay is a new moment of beginning." His work, which includes both functional vessels and sculptures, each is filled with lightness, humor and character, whether it be a face or a composition of eyes or hands. After his first New York solo show at White Columns in 2015, Sherman has gained momentum and now exhibits exhibits at Kaufmann/Repetto in Milan, Nicelle Beauchene in New York, and Sorry, We're Closed in Brussels.

Yun Hee Lee
1986, Seoul • Lives and works in Seoul

Yun Xi Li. Gallery HUUE Yun Hee Li. Spider castle, 2015

In precision ceramic work, Li depicts stories, fairy tales, and people experiencing fear, anxiety, or desire. “I consider my work to be an amphitheater where stories are told,” Lee says. "I started working like I was playing with dolls." She often combines images from Western literature with traditional Eastern ceramic techniques, and refers to optimistic stories she calls "cure" in which the protagonist is able to overcome obstacles and come to fulfillment. The result of her work is exuberant, fantastical scenes and figures in porcelain, which are covered in intricate patterns with gold details. For her recent work, Lee took Dante's Divine Comedy as her starting point, depicting the young heroine's journey as she navigates through hell, purgatory and heaven. The artist will show this work in Hong Kong, London, Shanghai and Icheon, South Korea.

Roberto Lugo
Philadelphia 1981 • Lives and works in Marlboro, Vermont

Robert Lugo. Biggie/Celia Cruz, 2016.
Gallery Veksler. 		Robert Lugo. Biggie/Celia Cruz, 2016.
Gallery Veksler.

Lugo is best known for his work with old ceramic vessels, on which he paints activists, politicians and hip-hop legends. The author seeks to reach out to different audiences. Roberto is a versatile person: potter, public figure, poet and teacher. For example, he works in a community where he teaches how to work with mosaics. The last theme of such a group wall painting is a tribute to those who died from gunshot wounds.

His work is a continuation of the experience gained in childhood in Philadelphia: from a rap battle at lunch to drawing doodles and graffiti with his name.

“Today my graffiti denies social inequality,” says Lugo. “Through my work, I want to convey my version of the history of Puerto Ricans in America, a low-income minority. I address art to those who don't believe they need it and incorporate them into deeper ways of knowing, learning and thinking. "

Lugo is currently working on a vase for the Higher Art Museum, part of the Black Clay. Review of African American Pottery" at Chicago State University, and in May he will be participating in the exhibition "Clash: Emmett Till and Beyond" at the Delaware Contemporary Art Center. age 14, after a white woman accused (later falsely confessing) him of molestation)

Aneta Regel
1976, Poland • Lives and works in London


Aneta Regel ©Sylvain Deleu Aneta Regel ©Sylvain Deleu

Regel's unusual anthropomorphic sculptures are inspired by the human body and nature - like the rocky landscape of northern Poland where she grew up - though they are also autobiographical and fantastical. In her work, she seeks to represent a state of metamorphosis and opposition, often by repeatedly firing and incorporating objects other than clay, such as volcanic rocks and feldspars.

"The interaction between these materials is essential to create shapes," Regel says. "Rocks move towards their break point and lava state, and my work often captures the moment of transition from one state to another."

Her striking sculptures, presented at the European Ceramics and Glass Triennial 2016, were also shown at Design Miami/Basel in June 2017 and at a solo exhibition in New York with Jason Jacques.

Coley Howven
1939, New York • Lives and works in Berkeley, California

Coley Howen. Howl, 1991. Ferrin Contemporary Coley Howen. Home throne, 1987.


Although she has worked with clay since college in the late 50s and early 60s, Howen gained recognition across the Bay in 2016 with the Museum of Art & Design's "Tell It By Heart" exhibition, her first solo exhibition and her first experience at the New York Museum. At the same time, Houwen has been actively involved in the development of the ceramic community for decades.

“When I discovered porcelain, my life changed forever,” says Howen. “Porcelain is one of the most difficult materials. Pure, white, with its own truth."

She uses the power and beauty of clay to make figurative sculptures, dioramas, pottery and other vessels. Most of the work is covered with transparent glaze, and sometimes with cobalt. Howen challenges classical European forms and ideas about women's work. Her subjects depict fantastical creatures (mermaids, beasts) and domestic items (clothing, kitchen items) in dreamlike scenes that seem light and playful at first glance, though they take on a deeper and darker meaning on longer viewing.

For over fifty years Houwen has been working in porcelain and creating psychologically charged sculpture. She is one of the first to bring feminist content to the clay. Howen uses china to honor the history of women's work, confront gender inequality, and depict the joys, fears, and failures of partnerships and parenting.

Jamie Porter Lara
1969 Spokane, Washington • Lives and works in Albuquerque, New Mexico

Jamie Porter Lara. Continue (part of the composition), 2016.
Photo by Addison Doty. National Museum of Women in Art, USA.

“It's like a collaboration,” Porter Lara says of the clay. “I rarely get to do what I originally intended, because clay has its own ideas. I like the feeling of being guided by the material.” She collects her clay from a site near Albuquerque, places it in plastic bottles, polishes it with a stone after it dries, and fires it in a pit in her front yard.

Her latest concept work concerns the ominous omnipresence of plastic bottles, which she views as contemporary artefacts. They are currently on solo display at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC. The series originated when Porter saw numerous two-liter bottles along the US-Mexico border. "I wasn't a ceramist, so at first the vessels were more 'organic', which led to the question of whether you could find a dividing line between nature, people and technology," she explains. Porter is now working on creating these works on a much larger scale for a solo show at Peters Projects in Santa Fe this fall.

Brian Rochefort
1985 Lincoln, RI • Lives and works in Los Angeles

Brian Rochefort Brian Rochefort

“Despite the fact that ceramics is one of the oldest means of expression,” says Rochefort, “it is largely ignored in contemporary art.” The artist explores the environment by making cups and pots, covering them with quirky layers of glaze, as well as through glossy sculptural work. His latest series, The Crater, focuses on landscapes and geological formations he has seen on trips to the Galapagos, Belize, Guatemala and East Africa.

While he has been under the scrutiny of galleries such as Sorry We're Closed in Brussels, Lefebvre & Fils in Paris and The Cabin and Richard Heller Gallery in Los Angeles, he has also impressed ceramic experts such as longtime CFile dealer and editor-in-chief Garth Clark, who included Rochefort in the exhibition he curated at the Boca Raton Museum of Art. "As for George Or, contemporary art in the vein of Mad Potter," along with the likes of Sterling Rubin, Ron Nagle and Betty Woodman. Clarke compares Rochefort to artists such as George Ochre, Sterling Ruby, Ron Nagle and Betty Woodman and calls his work modern art, showing the crazy soul of ceramics.

Ramesh Mario Nitriendran
1988, Colombo, Sri Lanka • Lives and works in Sydney

Ramesh Mario Nithiendran.
Nameless figure, 2016.
Photo by Simon Hewson. 		Ramesh Mario Nithiendran.
Nameless figure 2, 2016.
Photo by Simon Hewson.

Delving into the study of religion, sexuality and gender, Nithiendran creates wild, brash figures and totemic sculptures, complete with fake teeth, human hair, spray paint and resin. Being an atheist, he creates from his Hindu and Christian past experiences, as well as his experiences with the Internet and pornography. “There is a feeling - I can make something out of clay,” he says. “From a philosophical point of view, many stories born of material turn us to the past, present and future.”

In an effort to bypass traditional methods of working with clay, he developed unorthodox ways, such as creating individual parts and holding them together after firing, or working with carpenters and engineers to develop internal supports for his large-scale designs. Solo exhibition of Nithiendran at the National Gallery of Australia and the Museum of Art. Jana Potter, became a breath of fresh air and left behind a significant mark. He was featured in Sydney's new art biennale, The National: New Australian Art, in March 2017, had a solo exhibition in Sydney at the Sullivan + Strumpf Gallery, and at the Dhaka Summit in February 2018.

Cathy Sprague
1987, United Kingdom • Lives and works in London

Cathy Spragg. Wildness (part of the composition), 2016 Cathy Spragg. Winter meadow.

“As an artist, you're either a slob or you know exactly what you're doing,” Spragg says. “I'm definitely a slob; that's one of the reasons I work in clay."

Spragg brings clay installations and animations to life that tell interesting stories. In her latest creation, Spragg created tufts of grass in porcelain, making each thin stem by hand and attaching it to the base. In some of her works, dioramas of plant life are enclosed in wooden viewing boxes made by her partner Geoffrey Hugger. One such work was recently acquired by London's Victoria and Albert Museum. “I see my work as three-dimensional drawings in clay,” Spragg explains. Now a group of three collectors, including Spragg and her assistants, are working on the Tate Exchange project, which will end on March 10 with a master class where visitors to the fifth floor of the Switch House will be able to work with clay.

Cristina Tufinho
1982, Capetillo, Puerto Rico • Lives in New York and Philadelphia

Christina Tufino.
Augustine Ferreira Gallery 		Christina Tufino.
Augustine Ferreira Gallery

“Pottery is about touch, beauty and subjectivity, and about conveying ideas that can't be expressed in words,” Tufinho says. "My goal in my ceramic sculptures is to invoke past experiences or emotions." Exhibited at the Augustin Ferreira Gallery at NADA in New York in March 2017 and at LISTE in Basel in June 2018, her porcelain pieces often take the form of a human head or body part, or a featureless volume with a solitary nose or ear. They are covered with delicate glaze in pastel shades: pink, purple and blue. Tufinho begins her work by collecting images and objects, researching an archive of materials that belonged to her artist grandmother. She uses these found materials and personal impressions to develop sketches, which then become the basis of sculptures.

Endil Dyalwan
1978, Ngbozana, South Africa • Lives and works in Cape Town

Endil Dyalvan. Imiso Ceramics. Endil Dyalvan. Imiso Ceramics.


Gyalwan's work, which includes large handmade vessels, lamps, tables and other furniture, tells of the artist's current life in Cape Town, his upbringing in the village of Ngobozana in the Eastern Cape, as well as the traditions of Gyalwan's African ancestors. His first American solo exhibition last year at Friedman Benda in New York was titled "Camagu"; the mantra Xhosa, which translates as "I am grateful", took center stage in this display. Dyalwan uses the natural elements of earth, air, fire and water in his work, developing complex surfaces with sharp shapes and colors inspired by the Xhosa tradition, such as scarification. He also runs Imiso Ceramics, a Cape Town gallery and studio, with fellow artist Zizipho Posvoy.

Elizabeth Clay
1956 New York. Lives and works in New York

Elizabeth Clay. Tulip, 2016. CANADA Elizabeth Clay. Pineapple, 2016. CANADA

Clay's ceremonial vessels are inspired by the decorative traditions of Islamic, Byzantine and Asian art and design, as well as examples from the Viennese manufacturing community Wiener Werkstätte from early 1900s. “What attracted me to ceramics was that it seemed to offer freedom from the historical baggage that burdened painting,” Clay says. “I was also attracted by the light and color that often seems to spill out of a museum hall where Islamic pottery or European faience stands.”

Clay sculpts his instantly recognizable swirled clay urns and flasks, then smooths them out, applies homemade underglaze paints, and rips off pieces to add graphic designs such as flowers and calligraphic motifs. The artist currently exhibits at Pierre Marie Giraud in Brussels, CANADA in New York and has been featured in the Friez Gallery, New York.

Matt Wedel
1983 Palisade, CO • Lives and works in Athens, Ohio

Matt Videl. Figure with heads, 2015.
L.A. Lover 		Matt Videl. Banana tree, 2015.
L. A. Lover

The son of a ceramist, Wedel gravitated towards working with clay from an early age. “Clay is a material with great potential. It is functional and frivolous, liberating and giving support. Anything can be made from it: from sculpture to household items,” Wedel explains, “It gives unlimited space for interpretations to create forms and contents from my indefatigable imagination.”

His sculptures, often excessively tall and huge, up to seven feet in size, are the result of both the work of the author's imagination and historical references. A recent exhibition in Los Angeles, for example, consisting of ceramic trees, creatures and figures, was a fantastic improvisation on the paintings of the famous Edward Hicks "The Peaceful Kingdom" (1845-46). This spring, Wedel's personal exhibition will open in Los Angeles, as well as at the OMI International Art Center | Fields Sculpture Park in Ghent, New York.

Julia Haft-Candell
Oakland, CA 1982 • Lives and works in Los Angeles

Julia Haft-Candell. Friends. Parrasch Heijnen Gallery

Candell works in clay with humor and has her own take on how to use it; creating a sculptural work, it is as if she tests the pliability and strength of the material through giant knots or pretzels or asymmetrical drops covered with layers of translucent glazes. She often fires glazed work multiple times to achieve the exact depth of color. “With ceramics, I can draw and paint in three dimensions and create glazes with colors and surfaces that you can't do with any other material,” Candell says. She is currently exhibiting with two other artists at the Interface Gallery in Oakland and will have a solo show this fall at the Parrasch Heijnen Gallery in Los Angeles.

Jessica Stowler
Michigan 1981 • Lives and works in Brooklyn

Jessica Stowler. Untitled, 2016. P.P.O.W Jessica Stowler. Untitled, 2015. P.P.O.W

Stowler pottery recalls the graceful figures and smooth surfaces of European porcelain sculptures or Dutch still lifes, but it expresses ideas such as avarice and the ideal of female beauty, taking the form of female busts or body parts adorned with fine dresses and sugar lace. "Clay is sculpted, embellished, carved, worked, shaped or sculpted to create a wide range of effects and surfaces, from fleshy folds to syrup drips and gold chains," says Stowler.

She uses Chinese dyes to add color, often firing up to five times to get the right hues, and finishing with a pearly finish on the surface of the piece.

Stowler showed these works with PPOW at Art Basel in Hong Kong in March 2017, and in preparation for her next solo exhibition in New York, she will be working at the Shigaraki Pottery Cultural Park in Japan, supported by a grant from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation.

Aaron Angel
1987 Kent, UK • Lives and works in London

Aaron Angel. Syncretic hand, 2015.
Rob Tufnell, London/ Koln 		Aaron Angel. Pink bird, 2015.
Rob Tufnell, London/ Koln

A graduate of the Slade School, Angel opened Troy Town Art Pottery in London in 2014, where, along with his own work, he has represented over 60 artists. This spring, Angel and several Troy Town artists will be part of a new ceramics exhibition at Tate St. Ives.

"Ceramics, and glaze chemistry in particular, is a relatively simple, specialized science," Angel says. “But if you let her, she will lead you down amazing rabbit holes, looking for, say, a glaze that mimics foamy lapis lazuli. ”

His own man-made sculptures, Dioramas for Surrealist Sculptures, will be featured in solo exhibitions this year at the Rob Toofnell Gallery in London and Glasgow Modern Art Gallery. His approach to ceramics is deeply intertwined with the belief that the material should not be used according to its history and associations, although Angel's work reflects his passion for mastering and experimenting with homemade glazing and firing recipes.

Geng Hu
1983, China. • Lives and works in Beijing.

Geng Hu. Losing one's head in a landscape from hands, 2014.
Klein Sun Gallery 		Geng Hu. Gate in the mountains, 2016.

A former student of renowned artist Xu Bing at Beijing Central Academy of Fine Arts, Geng uses porcelain in many of her works, drawing on its symbolic and material properties. She addresses the historical significance of this material as a link between Eastern and Western traditions. For the 2015 exhibition at the Klein Sang Gallery, Geng Geng collected information on the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Zhuangji; for her animated puppet film MR Sea, she brought porcelain figures to life in a story inspired by Pu Songling's stories written during the Qing Dynasty. Using the traditional blue and white palette, Geng creates beautiful sculptures and scenes, as well as coarser abstract forms.

Gareth Mason
1965, Pembroke, Wales • Lives and works in London

Gareth Mason. Weighted, 2011-2015.
Jason Jacques Gallery 		Gareth Mason. Clusterf**k, 2008-…
Jason Jacques Gallery

“As a self-proclaimed sensualist, I see clay as the ideal medium through which to explore a vessel as a vehicle for emotional potential,” says Mason, known for creating pots that seem to explode. “And, unlike other artists, I play with fire. In my works - the breath of the dragon. Of course, there are also difficulties, but they are a source of endless surprises.

Mason seeks to create emotional weight in his work by developing physical tension within it. He eschews traditional working rules in favor of unusual combinations of clay, glazes and raw minerals. The process, he says, is meant to "leave a vivid, energetic mark on the work and therefore (hopefully) on the imagination." Although his living vessels are currently exhibited at the Jason Jacques Gallery in New York, Mason will also be participating in group exhibitions at the Yale Center for British Art and the Boca Raton Museum.

Bari Zieperstein
1978 Chicago • Lives and works in Lons Angeles

Barry Zieperstein. Barry Zieperstein.

I chose clay for its limitless ability to transform and for its historicity,” Zieperstein says. Although she is known for her BZippy & Co. - especially incredible vessels inspired by Rachel Samy's Spring/Summer 2016 collection - Zieperstein's art is based on historical narratives, feminism and conceptual themes. Her current project in residence at the AD&A Museum at UC Santa Barbara is based on Soviet-era posters found in the Wende Museum, a Cold War archive in Culver City. Her work shows us women judging each other; the artist plays on how women are pitted against each other and limited by societal expectations. "While I know these posters are satire, they are very relevant to what's going on with the current US administration," Zieperstein says.

Rochelle Goldberg
1984 Vancouver • Lives and works in New York

Rochelle Goldberg. The Cannibal Actif (detail), 2015
Mirror Cells at Whitney Museum of American Art,
New York 		Rolshel Goldberg. Tangled Ball #2, 2016. Frankel Gallery.

Ceramics is just one part of the Goldberg installations that illuminate the post-industrial world. They have been shown in a solo exhibition by the Sculpture Center in Long Island and the Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo, and are also included in "

Mirror Cells

”, Whitney. Goldberg often uses dark "metallic" ceramics in installations that speak to environmental issues and mix synthetic and natural materials. Ceramics, steel, and wood are as common as snails, chia, and crude oil. Her past work has deftly combined ceramics and steel to depict the skeleton of a fish or a bucket of oil.

Original article
Translated by Kristina Bobrova especially for the Russian Academy of Crafts
When copying, reference to the source is required.

Victorian Majolica - PAILISH — LiveJournal

Over the weekend, we bought a decorative plate in the form of a begonia leaf, decorated with colored lead glaze, at an auction. Such products were produced in England and the USA in the years 1870-1890, and they are commonly called victorian majolica. It was the time of Darwinism and natural history, foreign botanical expeditions and the flourishing of rural gardens in England. There was a boom in naturalistic pottery. Our new plate is from this period of time.


Begonias have great leaves, even simple outdoor begonias. We have two begonias - a dot home shelf (leaf in the center) and an ordinary street one with scarlet flowers (top right). Some begonias with decorative leaves look simply amazing, creating a vibrant tropical garden atmosphere. That is why this plate is so attractive to us.

Plates and dishes in the form of begonia leaves were produced by several manufactories in England and the USA. In England, one of the major manufacturers of Majolica Begonia Leaf plate was the Edge, Malkin & Co pottery, established in 1870 in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, and went bankrupt in 1902 year. The company produced not only their majolica products, but also porcelain dishes. The begonia leaf was also produced by smaller growers.

The No. 1 manufacturer of majolica begonia leaves in the US was Griffin, Smith & Hill of Pennsylvania. In 1867, John Griffen and his partner W.A.H. Schreiber formed a pottery firm with the Philadelphia Iron Works, producing refractory bricks and wares decorated with Rockingham Glaze (manganese brown glaze). In 1871, John Smith, an English potter from Stoke-on-Trent, joined the company, and Schreiber left soon after. Griffen's sons joined the company and brought with them another English potter, William Hill. English potters brought with them the secrets of creating Victorian majolica, and among other things, the company began to produce Majolica Begonia Leaf plate.
Many dealers who sell American plates refer to them as English. In fact, this is not far from the truth. The school is the same, Stoke-on-Trent.

Naturally, Victorian majolica is not limited to Majolica Begonia Leaf plate. These plates are just a tiny piece of victorian majolica.
Victorian majolica is faience ware with several colored layers of lead glaze applied at the same time on the piece and then fired.
Minton developed two ways to create such pottery.
The first method produced a product imitating old Italian majolica, but using English clays. Minton called this product "majolica" after the Italian "majolica". It was a magnificent ceramic, but, unfortunately, commercially unsuccessful.Today, any item of "Italian" Minton majolica is a rarity.

Minton. A large majolica dish, in the center of which is a portrait of Empress Eugenie of France. It is in the Royal Collection. Exhibited at the Paris Exhibition in 1855. The second dish, centered on Queen Victoria, is in the Victoria and Albert Museum. Both dishes were decorated by Thomas Kirby using decorative motifs from a 16th-century Italian majolica dish, also in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum.

The second method was developed in 1849 under the name "Palissy" and later became known as "majolica".
Palissy ware was named after the famous 16th century French potter Bernard Palissy, who called his work rustique ("rustic"). Products in this style, which later became "Victorian majolica", were created between 1851 and 1900. Characterized by deep vibrant colors, elegant and sometimes whimsical, even humorous designs - from conservatory tables to flower pot holders.
By 1875, Victorian colored-glazed majolica pottery was a commercial sensation. Manufacturers in Europe and the US have reinvented Arnoux glazes and kilns, creating many shapes with slightly different palettes. Today, Victorian majolica is back in fashion, used by decorators and collected by collectors.

In garden design, this flowerpot will look quite modern

Victorian majolica was created by Minton & Co. It was first exhibited at the Great Exhibition of 1851.

Title page of the exhibition catalogue. Pot and stand in Minton majolica in the grotesque style of Italian renaissance majolica. Lithograph depicting flower pots, coasters and garden seats in Minton majolica.

Minton majolica products remain unsurpassed

Approximately 10 years after the phenomenal success of Minton majolica, the Wedgwood company also began the production of majolica (the grandsons of the founding father of the company were run very badly, and the situation only changed when Godfrey Wedgwood took over the company , great-grandson). Godfrey attracted a whole galaxy of famous artists. Some of these artists had either previously worked for Herbert Minton or continued to design for both firms during the many years of majolica production. Starting the production of majolica, Wedgwood used his vast historical resources and adapted for majolica a number of neoclassical 18th century motifs that had previously been produced from creamware, black basalt and jasper.

Wedgwood majolica cheesecake and umbrella stand

Despite a late start, Wedgwood majolica production was huge, successfully saturating the domestic market and supplying new markets in America and Australia

One of the most successful Victorian majolica company was George Jones and Sons. The majolica of George Jones is not inferior to the majolica of Minton and Wedgwood both in design and in workmanship.
Jones was the youngest of nine children in a family with no connection to the pottery industry. At fourteen he began a seven-year apprenticeship with Minton, and upon completion in 1844 worked as a traveling salesman for Wedgwood. It was not until 1862 that George Jones entered the ceramics business, with his two eldest sons becoming partners. George Jones won a medal at the Paris Exposition of 1867 and received recognition at the London (1871), Vienna (1873) and Sydney (1876) exhibitions. The company made cupids from majolica, shells, dolphins, birds, figurines and coral ornaments in various forms, snuff boxes, dog bowls, vases, serving plates, tea sets, jugs, syrniki, desks, garden chairs, cake molds, anchovy boxes and much more.

When collectors talk about the top three majolica pottery in England, they always mention Minton, George Jones and Wedgwood. But there were other companies that produced majolica. Maybe this majolica did not have such a complex design, not such a bright glaze, and the companies themselves were not so promoted, but their products are quite worthy of attention. For example, majolica by Joseph Holdcroft and Company.
Unlike most of those who worked in the pottery industry, Joseph Holdcroft was not born into poverty. He was the son of a wealthy pottery owner, William Holdcroft. After graduating from the Wedgwood Pottery Institute, he joined his father's pottery business, where he developed several pottery patents. Like George Jones before him, Joseph Holdcroft then worked at Minton. He later opened his own business. The company's product was highly respected and sold well in its day. The prestige of the company fell when it switched to the production of cheap majolica, and later the production of enameled bricks was added.

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