In 2020, I was selected as one of 5 Commissioned Artists to work on the ‘Leach 100’, a centenary celebration for the life, works and legacy of the pioneer of British studio pottery, Bernard Leach.
I chose to respond to the ‘Leach Aesthetic’, focussing on brushwork. Leach believed that post industrialisation in ceramics, patterns and shapes had lost their vitality, I wanted to help find it again.
“The pot in order to be good should be a genuine expression of life”.
On his teachings on ‘brushwork’ in ‘A Potter’s Book’, Leach advised an ‘Occidental student’ to obtain some ‘good’ brushes. taking this literally, I proposed to craft my own. Visiting the Leach Pottery, St Ives, I foraged locally for materials from which to make my brushes for decoration: feathers, twigs, plastic etc to form a true connection to the region. In my London studio, thus prepared, I began studies into mark making with my new tools, starting with a series of ‘exercises’ on paper before deciding which lent itself best to which type of mark. Then working in clay, I began to explore mark making using wax resist to create relief across the surfaces of the pots, allowing it to dry before wiping back with a damp sponge to leave the decoration in raised relief on greenware. I used one brush per pattern, one pattern per pot and built 9 large ceramic bottle forms.
Shadow and light play across their exterior, decoration becomes subtly imbedded in the form, part of the piece and in tune with the Leach ethos that for a pattern to be good, it must be “freely executed, combine with and improve the form.”
The work was exhibited at The Leach Pottery, St Ives as well as at the British Ceramics Biennial, Stoke on Trent. Other selected Artists; Rosanna Martin, David Paton, Steve Claydon and Aaron Angell.
