And Evening With Women @the Well and Claudia Clare

An Evening with Women@the Well and Claudia Clare. 

Weds Sept 15th, 2021, 6 - 8pm, doors close 9pm. 

6.30 Claudia Clare - artist working with Women @the Well

6.45 Harriet Wistrich - Founder of the Centre for Women's Justice 

6.55 Lynda Dearlove  - CEO Women @the Well 

7.10 A minute's silence ended with the smashing of the pot, 'Brave Face.' 

The evening includes a display of the pots from our joint project, 'And The Door Opened.'  

I will be talking about the pots and the project and the director of W@W will discuss the work they have been doing over the past 18 months and how Covid has affected the women they support. 

About the Project:

W@W is a women-only service located in Kings Cross dedicated to supporting women whose lives are affected - or at risk of being affected - by prostitution. They also offer support to women wishing to exit the sex trade and help them to identify and overcome the barriers that maybe obstructing that process. 

‘And The Door Opened,’ is a collection of pots, made in partnership with W@W, that illustrate the lives of the women they work with, based on accounts provided by the women themselves. Some of the pots represent the accounts of women survivors who have already exited and others are still involved in prostitution. 

The aim is to enhance the public's understanding of what prostitution is and to show that, with the right support, girls and women do not need to live and die exploited in the sex trade – there are ways out.

The Summer Pots: Summer Rain, 2017, currently showing at Gallery 286, 286 Earl's Court Road, London SW5 9AS June 8th - 30th 2017

The Summer Pots at Gallery 286

A burst of sunshine illuminates a torrential summer rain and umbrellas in Oxford Street.

Ther is far less scrafitto on this pot than in earlier works. This one is almost all brush work.

Earthenware pot, coil built, approx 62cms high, slip-painted with clear glaze.

New and Recent work - These pots will be shown in 'Hidden', 6 Mason's Yard, SW1Y 6BU, September 2016, and at GAllery 286, Earls Court Road, SW5 9AS, November 2016

From the Top
Nightwalker, (2014)
Travelling West, (2013),
WW1 1915-6, Ararat to Albania, (2015),
Me with 'Drinking Hemlock' (2015), Postcard from the Caliphate in the background,
Me with Drinking Song for GAlloway, (2015,) as above,
Postcard from the Caliphate, (2016)
Postcard from the Caliphate, (2016)

Danse Macabre or Postcard From The Caliphate, (2015-16)

Danse Macabre / Postcard From The Caliphate, (2015-16)

This pot is all but finished. It has yet to be professionally photographed, and still lacks the lustre firing that will deepen some of the reds and help to vary the local colour and colour saturation.

No one likes Islamic State, or ISIL or The Caliphate, or whichever name we use. Lampooning IS is, well, therapy perhaps but it makes no difference. It works as satire but as serious social or political critique, attacking IS is hardly subversive by anyone's standards, unless, of course, the viewer just happens to be a supporter. The critique in this pot is aimed at what is currently referred to as the 'regressive Left.' It may also be called, the 'hard Left,' 'the pseudo Left,' 'the Apologist Left,' or just 'Nothing Left.' Again, call it what you will, it amounts to the same thing: that part of the British political Left which is apologist in its attitude and response to Islamism, which routinely appeases dictators and fascist or fascistic leaders, as long as they threaten America and/or Israel. In short, it is the Left-overs that have thrown their lot in the far Right.

The targets then are 'Stop the War,' (see the Stop the War jugs in this post,) George Galloway, Anjem Choudary, Julian Assange, Asim Qureshi and Moazzem Beg (CAGE), Yvonne Ridley,  and assorted fawning, selfie-taking, followers, who dance around the base of pot, genuflecting and group-hugging their idols, (thank you, Nicholas Poussin and the Golden Calf.)

The appeased leaders are: Vladmimir Putin, Bashar Al Assad, Sayeed Ali Khamenei, Kings Abdullah and Salman, (House of Saud),  Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Hasan Nasrullah, (Hezbollah), Khaled Meshal (Hamas), Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, and assorted jihadis including Mohammad Emwazi. They all ride the Islamist Roundabout in one direction or another. The Islamist flag is depicted in butt-plugs - my thanks to the clever, imaginative soul who made the original for the 2015 London Gay Pride. I also salute Mark Gertler's magnificent Merry-Go-Round in this pot.

The Reappearance of The Clause 28 Tea Set, 1988, at The Pankhurst Centre, 2015

I made the Clause 28 Tea Set while still learning pottery at evening classes in 1988.

Clause 28

Clause 28, as it came to be known, sought to prohibit local government from both ‘promoting’ homosexuality and from publishing ‘material with the intention of promoting homosexuality.’ Further, it specified that ‘the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship’ would also be prohibited. While all branches of the gay community were outraged at the bill as a whole, the latter part, referring to the ‘pretended family relationship,’ seemed to target lesbian mothers in particular. This, I suspect, was one of the driving forces behind many of the specifically lesbian protests which occurred consistently throughout that year.

The Tea Set

The Clause 28 Tea Set comprises eight cups or mugs, eight plates, two teapots, a jug and a sugar bowl. The cups and mugs record the most imaginative and, in some cases, notorious of the political protests by lesbians. Two stand out to this day as dazzlingly audacious: the ‘lesbians are out,’ protest, (February 2, 1988), in which three lesbians abseiled into the chamber of the House of Lords from the public gallery; and the invasion of the BBC Six O’Clock News, (May 23, 1988), with Sue Lawley and Nicholas Witchell. I am proud to say that I witnessed the abseiling lesbians. I was in the gallery at the time having been lobbying parliament earlier - another of the cups records my vastly more prosaic efforts. Two more cups record a ‘kiss-in’ at Eros, in Piccadilly Circus, London, and the overnight appearance of a number pink triangles attached to statues of the great and good, also in London. There is a scene from the protest march in Manchester; a protest showing a group of women, dressed as suffragettes, who chained themselves to the railings of Buckingham Palace, (March 8 1988); and a protest in which I took part, at the Ideal Home Exhibition in London’s Olympia where a group of twenty-five lesbians occupied one of the houses, on March 13 1988, Mothering Sunday, and threw pink protest leaflets out of one of the upstairs windows and unfurled a huge banner from another supporting the rights of lesbian mothers.

One of the teapots records the Manchester march, (Februray 20 1988), and the other, triangular one, the various lesbian conferences and events that took place that year. The images for the Manchester march were all from photographs that I took and still have. The milk jug was a moment to send up our own seriousness – it pictures a herd of assorted animals sporting pink triangles, including rat, demanding rights. A little self-irony was an essential part of the political survival tool-kit.

How it got to the Pankhurst Centre

I kept the tea set until about 2001, when I moved from Todmorden to London. I felt I had hung on to it for long enough and asked the Pankhurst Centre if they would like it. They accepted the donation along with some other plates and we stayed in touch for a year or so. Some time later, I contacted the centre and was told that they knew nothing of these ceramics. Much later, roundabout 2010, I tried again. This time I was advised that there had been some building work done resulting in much of the centre’s collection going into storage and some of it being distributed to other museums, but, again, the woman I spoke to knew nothing of these pieces. I, meanwhile, consistently reassured myself that pots have a habit of resurfacing when they’re ready.

How it was found

Dinah Winch, Director of Elizabeth Gaskell House, who knows my work and included it ‘Fired Up,’ 2010, while she was working at Gallery Oldham, contacted me to ask if some ceramics that had been found at the Pankhurst Centre were mine. The current management had decided a food bank would be a good idea. A room was available downstairs but was packed tight, from floor to ceiling with junk, so tight that it was near impossible to get into the room at all. Two courageous volunteers, Karen and Julie, set about clearing it. Some days later, right at the back, having disposed of everything else – they found a sink – ‘…with running water! “Who knew?!”…’ wrote Rachel Lappin, Pankhurst Centre Manager, in an email to me. Under the sink, fully expecting to find more rubbish, dried up cleaning materials and assorted spiders, they found The Clause 28 Tea Set.

Rachel continues: ‘I don’t think you will be able to appreciate their surprise and joy at finding and uncovering these most beautiful pieces of ceramic work that we now know to be your tea set and plates! Of course they called me down to inspect it, and I was – rarely!! – speechless; the pieces literally took my breath away! We didn’t know anything about any of the items, except that we assumed that they must have been made in the ceramics workshops that we know were held at the Centre in the early 90s, although of course we now know that this isn’t the case, and that they were made by you! … I can honestly say that finding this work was most certainly a major highlight of my time so far at the Centre; we just couldn’t believe what we had come across, hidden away amongst a load of junk in a room in the basement!?’

Afterword

It has taken a while, but I do now have some understanding of why they were so excited. I guess it's not everyday that, while clearing junk from under a sink, you find a tea set recording a part of your own history. I was sure it would turn up somewhere in the centre. I didn't believe it had been re-donated  - life just isn't like that. It is just much more likely that things get lost for a bit and then turn up, particularly in places where funding - and therefore workers - come and go like changes in the weather.

I'm hugely grateful to everyone at the centre and to their two resident PhD students, who are researching the centre's history, for the considerable trouble to took to trace me and let me know that it was, after all, still there. I'm also grateful they took the trouble to communicate their enthusiasm for tea set to me - it has reminded me why I made it in the first place.

Those interested in the teaching of ceramics may also like to note that Rachel Lappin was not far wrong in her assumption that the tea set was made at the centre in the 1990s. It was made in very similar circumstances, in an adult education class, in Brixton, but just a few years earlier. Some of the ceramics degree courses may be closing now but there are many more ways to learn and they too can lead the student towards life as a professional, full-time maker. The Pankhurst Centre, I'm delighted to say, held a series of pottery classes for women. The Clause 28 Tea Set was on show to inspire and encourage their students - which is exactly what it should have been doing. 

British Ceramics Biennianl: Display of five of my pots in the Award Show 2013, at the Potteries Museum and Art Gallery

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This post is in response to some of the questions I have been asked since my five pots went on display at the British Ceramics Biennial as part of the Award Show 2013.

The following links will take you to more images of the pots and some of the events and stories that prompted me to make them.

The above image is a selection of five of my pots at the Potteries Museum and Art Gallery in Stoke on Trent. From left to right the pots are: Travelling West, St. Mark of the Farm, Pageant, Nothing Like a Kiss, (slightly in front and lower down,) and, far right, ‘Remembering Atefeh.’

Travelling West

Travelling West was made especially for BCB and has yet to be photographed by itself. I have written a post, outlining the story that it depicts. The post is directly below this one. The images are phone photos taken in my studio. They are a ‘tour’ of pot, turning anti-clockwise.

St. Mark of the Farm

My blog post about this is as a companion piece to another pot, Wedding Procession, and can be seen here with images of both pots. The first image shows both pots, with St. Mark of the Farm on the left. The next two images are both view of St. Mark of the Farm. There is a detailed account of the story and landscapes that feature on the pot, (it depicts the funeral of Mark Duggan). It was done as a ‘tryptich.’ There are three main views to the pot, which borrows from the convention of the Renaissance altar-piece. There is more in the blog post to explain this decision and also the title. More images can be seen here.

Pageant

More images of Pageant can be seen here. A general introduction to the exhibition, ‘An Extraordinary Turn of Events,’ of which it was a part, is here.

There’s Nothing Like a Kiss

My Blog post is here. Images of this pot and the two others in Molly’s Odyssey, can be seen here on my page of Francis Kyle Gallerywebsite.

Remembering Atefeh

More images of this pot, including the interior imagery, can be seen here. There story of Atefeh and of the making of the pot is here.

Travelling West

The Journey
Travelling West depicts the journey of my friend  Hossein, as he travelled overland from his home town, Qazvin, in Western Iran, to England, seeking asylum. He left at Iranian New Year, March 2006, and arrived at a service station on the M1 in June the same year.  During the three months he travelled by bus to a village close to the Iran –Turkey border. From there he went by truck to another village where he joined the smuggler route to get over the border, travelling through the mountain passes on horse-back to avoid check points. From a village on the Turkish side, he travelled by lorry and on foot: the lorry took the refugees by road but when a check point was in sight, they had to walk, at night, over the mountains to reconnect with the road and another truck on the other side of that check point. From the Turkish city of Van, he took a bus to Istanbul, using forged identity papers in case he was questioned at one of the fourteen checkpoints on the way from Eastern to Western Turkey. From Istanbul he went by lorry, with another group, to Ezmir and from there by boat to the Greek mainland and on to Athens. At every point of change, he was passed on to a new trafficker, each one arranged by the one before. From Athens he went by plane to Paris, Orly where he took the metro to Gare du Nord and took the train to Calais. At Calais, in the queue for food, provided by kindly French charity workers, he met an old friend. They made a sleeping place in the cabin of an old crane until, one night, after numerous attempts, they got on a lorry which took them to England, disgorging them all in the car park of a service station on the M1.

Hunger and Danger

This is the simplified outline of the journey, the bare bones, if you like. The full story includes constant and gnawing fear and anxiety, not knowing who he would encounter next, what the trafficker would be like, what his fellow travellers would be like, what the conditions of travel were like: the boat, for example, was not seaworthy and they only just avoided drowning. The traffickers varied, some intensely violent, others, kind souls, themselves trapped in a debt-bondage cycle to another, ‘more senior’ trafficker – a debt-bondage avoided by Hossein himself only because he took a risk and refused the financial demands of his trafficker-in-chief once in England. It was a risk that paid off.  At times he didn’t eat or drink for a week at a time, often at the most arduous points. In the mountains, for example, they had only berries and snow. Even when there was food, it was only bread and tea. The hardest thing though, was the powerlessness, not knowing until the last minute, if the next trafficker would come and if he could do the next stage of the journey or if he would be stuck, locked in a dingy room forever unable even to return to Iran.

Masoud

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What really colours the entire journey, however, are the relationships between Hossein and the people with whom he was connected. His task was to escort two people from Istanbul to London. These two were from a wealthy Qazvin family. The Trafficker-in-Chief, Masoud, was their older brother and Hossein’s former employer. Hossein idolised this man. ‘He was a like a prophet, well educated and always polite. I was only seventeen, from a poor family, and had little education. He taught me everything.’ Masoud’s business, where Hossein was employed, had failed, partly because he was member of an opposition group, the Mujahideen, and was endlessly obstructed by other traders in the bazaar, who were government supporters, and also because he was issued with bogus penalties and fines by government officials. By way of revenge, Masoud become a small-time crook, deliberately defrauding the other traders of considerable amounts of money, and eventually fled Iran, in 2000, to escape his debtors. Masoud had left Hossein in Iran to face both the police and the wrath of the other traders in the bazaar. In the police cell he was beaten and threatened with torture. He could hear the sounds of other prisoners being tortured. Some six years passed during which Hossein was unable to work legally because of his former connections with Masoud. When Masoud eventually contacted Hossein and asked him to escort his brother and neice to England, Hossein eagerly accepted, hoping their friendship might be restored and trusting that Masoud would acknowledge what he had suffered on his behalf and would, somehow, make amends. The plan was to meet Masoud and his brother and niece in Istanbul. Masoud would fly from England, the other two from Iran. They all had money and passports and could do this legally. Hossein had to make his way overland, alone, with no money, no passport and equipped with nothing but his wits and hope. He was to meet them in Istanbul.

The Meeting

When he eventually arrived in Istanbul, hungry, terrified, and with only the clothes he was wearing, his delight on meeting his old employer, friend and mentor was overwhelming. ‘When I met Masoud in Istanbul, we hugged for whole minute. He cooked me a meal. It was a feast.’ Then, later the same evening, came an unexpected twist: ‘They laughed at my clothes. I hadn’t been able to wash. I knew I didn’t smell good. Masoud bought me new clothes and a tooth-brush. Then he demanded I pay him back, even the toothbrush was listed on the bill. For the last six years I had endured beatings and threats in Iran, then risked my life travelling over the mountains and dodging military check points in Turkey. I did all this for him. In return, he presented me with the bill for a toothbrush.’

There was nothing Hossein could do. He was dependent on Masoud who would finance the rest of the journey and, even then, only on the condition that he escort his two relatives.

The realisation that he had lost, not only any hope of reparation and recognition for his loyalty, but also the man he loved most in the world, more, even, than anyone in his family, hit him harder than any of the dangers on the journey. His ‘prophet’ had been replaced by a dangerous criminal and trafficker, a cynical operator bent only on extortion and profit. For a young man, very much alone in the world, the emotional impact was, perhaps, a greater threat to his life than the furious Aegean Sea that almost engulfed them on the next stage of his journey. Though not technically alone at this stage, he was, in some ways, more alone than ever. He had responsibility for two, ‘incompetent and half-witted rich kids.’ He still had his wits but hope for his friendship with Masoud had evaporated entirely. He understood that, far from being a friend, he had sunk from employer, to servant to bonded-serf and, at best, would end up in London in debt to Masoud who would, doubtless, try to get him to become a trafficker too in order to pay off the debt.

Conclusion

Travelling West shows the physical journey. It also depicts Hossein making frequent phone calls. These punctuated every stage of the journey, confirming its progress or not.  They also, gradually, settled the nature of the relationships between Hossein and his family and between Hossein and Masoud. They indicate human connection but they also signify immense loss.

Our traveller arrived at an anonymous motorway service station in June 2006 alone, under threat of debt-bondage, and hungry. Since then he has been slowly rebuilding his life, free of all contact with Masoud and his family having refused to pay off any of the ‘debt.’ Journey’s end, for this first stage of one man’s odyssey seeking asylum in Britain, was in Stoke on Trent, where he was granted asylum in recognition of the political problems that dogged him after Masoud left.

I am delighted to have the opportunity to show Travelling West, for the first time, in the Potteries Museum and Art Gallery, in Stoke on Trent, as part of my display in the Award Show, 2013, at the British Ceramics Biennial. This is a new work, made especially for the BCB. It is dedicated to my friend, Hosssein, and to all refugees and migrant workers and their extraordinary determination to succeed against the odds.

Letter from the CPA council circulated to CPA members about the future of the organisation as a whole and of Ceramic Review in particular.

The letter above, in two separate images, is the one circulated to CPA members. It seems clear and innocuous enough but is startling in its deceit. The reality is much simpler. The independent editor has been removed and has not been given the choice to return. The new 'guest' editor is a CPA member and, I believe, former chair of the CPA council. The editorial, far from being 'no longer in-house' is about as 'in-house' as it could get. The notion of a 'guest' here is meaningless since there is no editor, as such, to invite the guest. Moreover, and, arguably, even more worrying, there is no mention whatsoever of the writing, editorial, or publishing experience of any of these people comprising this new, collective, editorship. The appointment of Jack Doherty as the new 'guest' editor has now been announced on the Ceramic Review Facebook page. The first comment it attracted sums it all up nicely: 'The maffia (sic) strikes again.'  The first comment to arrive on my share of the document above was, 'What worries me is that the same (one or two) people are now in charge of who gets into the CPA, who gets into Ceramic Art London AND what is published in Ceramic Review.' Quite. I wouldn't argue with a single word of either of those two comments. 

We Are Ceramic Review! An open letter to the CPA regarding the future of CR

This is a post I thought I would never have to write and now do so with considerable regret and concern.

You may have heard - either from Bonnie herself or from other sources - that Dr Bonnie Kemske's contract as Editor of Ceramic Review was recently terminated by the Craft Potters Association. No new editor has been appointed. There are no adverts so far posted seeking a new editor. There appear to be no plans, as yet, to appoint a new editor, and, as things stand at the moment, there is nothing on the CPA website concerning these upheavals at Ceramic Review. Moreover, most CPA members know nothing of these changes. The only member of the CPA council that I have spoken to 'didn't know enough about it' to discuss the issue with me.

** Latest update **  CPA have now informed their members that the Jack Doherty will be the first guest editor but there is still no news on the long term plan for an editor as far as I understand.

In addition to this, we know that promotion of Ceramic Review abroad has been terminated and the focus of the magazine is now to be national only. 

A small group of us have written the following open letter to the CPA calling for an Extraordinary General Meeting so that we can put our concerns to them directly. You may have many more questions you would like to ask. 

Please take a look at the letter here below, which we plan to send to the CPA council with a list of signatories, and, if you agree and would like to add your name, please send an email to weareceramicreview@gmail.com with a YES as your subject line and your name as the message - with any comments you may wish to make, by midnight Friday 20th September. Please also email or share this post via twitter or facebook to anyone you think might also like to add their name. 116 people have so far added their name via email and many more via facebook. Don't forget to send the email or let me know via fb by Friday 20th! 

Many thanks from The C Word

Dear Craft Potters Association Board Members,

We write to express our deep disappointment at the recent removal of Dr Bonnie Kemske as editor of Ceramic Review.

We feel strongly that, under her editorship, the magazine has taken on a new lease of life. Over the last three years we have welcomed the publication’s broader perspective, particularly enjoying the international dimension, and the inclusion of a wide variety of ceramic production. The range of articles about industry, studio pottery, installation work, sculpture, and public and community art projects, have provided an excellent overview of the breadth of production and the scale of ambition that defines our field. 

It is this mix, combined with the international coverage, that gives Ceramic Review its considerable, and currently unparalleled, national and international status.

Our shared concern is that the broad-based appeal of Ceramic Review, its inclusive, democratic, and international content, and tone of open debate, is set to become increasingly conservative and narrow. This would be a great shame. At best, these are very challenging times for magazines. Narrowing the Ceramic Review remit will, almost certainly, reduce its readership and threaten its survival.

Many of us are CPA members, Ceramic Review subscribers and contributors as well as readers. We are all stakeholders in the Ceramic Review enterprise. The welfare and future success of this magazine affects us all. We urge you to retain a progressive and inclusive agenda for Ceramic Review, under an independent editorship.

We would welcome an opportunity to discuss these issues further and call for you to hold an extraordinary general meeting for that purpose.

Signed:

Collect 2012

I have reviewed Collect twice in its illustrious history – ok, once, (2008) and a brief comment at the end of another post, (2009). I then forgot about it until last year when a kind soul reserved complimentary tickets for me and I managed to be away the entire weekend.  I have been inattentive, to say the least.

My first visit to Collect was also its first outing. It was at the V&A and still had the feel of ‘tarted –up’ clutter. It was too crowded – with stuff I mean - and the standard was inconsistent. After another year at the V&A, it moved to the Saatchi gallery near Sloane Square. It was a bold and, in spite of my acerbic comments in 2009, an inspired move. By all accounts it has improved steadily since and, while I cannot comment on any of previous shows, 2012 was a triumph.

The Saatchi gallery is a beautiful, elegantly proportioned space, graced with high ceilings, magnificent wooden floors and plenty of natural light. It is the perfect venue for the display of beautiful objects. The exhibiting galleries all had plenty of room so the work displayed had room to breathe and the audience had enough space to walk around it. In practice, this means that the viewer moves much more slowly around the exhibition than is the case in more crowded venues. It allows one time to think and reflect of the work.

Collect is a serious selling show. That is its primary purpose. It is also a showcase but makes no pretence to being either representative or a survey show. The galleries select their highest quality work and the organisers, by bringing in collectors and media, facilitate the bringing of ‘museum quality’ craft to its potential buyers. In doing so, they are starting solve one of the most persistent and seemingly intractable problems of craft: how to bring the goods to market.

In the process, every aspect of craft exhibiting and selling, from display to the attitude of the gallerists, has become palpably more professional. Collect is also truly international now. It is probably the only high-end, international applied arts fair in Europe. The Scandanavian galleries and artists are particularly well represented and are also a breath of fresh air. There is a strong focus on the ‘upcycled’ work, where ‘trash’ or discarded ceramics, in particular, are remade, reinvented and become entirely new works. In most cases this is the only chance Londoners have to see this kind of work. Craft in London is otherwise parochial, poorly exhibited, (with one or two notable exceptions,) and largely very conservative.

La Ceramica Gallery was a welcome new addition, bringing the work of internationally acclaimed Nicaraguan potters to London for the first time, and Hanart TZ was the first Chinese gallery to show at Collect, bringing ceramics and laquer work  - the latter is a particularly exciting development since, as far as I know, we have not seen contemporary laquer work in this country before. If I were handing out prizes, it would go to the Japanese gallery, Yufuku. All of the work on this stand was breathtaking. Every piece shone with the sheer strength and conviction of its own presence. Graceful, classical, poised - even when entirely un-classical – it was all work you wanted to come back to again and again, just to make sure you really had seen such a thing. The ceramic works of Nakamura Takuo were unforgettable. The colour and patterning was reminiscent of early 17^th Century Japanese silks, glistening, strong colour but subtle – mostly tertiary colours -  and faultlessly composed with a painterly vision. How anyone brings together soft ripe pinks, sombre but glowing maroons, lime-ish greens edged in something darker, and bright ultramarine, is beyond me. I could gaze on this work for the rest of my life and, as soon as I have any money at all, I’m going to make sure I can.

Emmanuel Cooper, 1938-2012

Emmanuel Cooper, potter, writer, historian, teacher, friend and mentor, died on the 21^st of January, 2012.  He was, and will remain, one of the central figures in British twentieth century ceramics. He was the alchemist who transformed studio pottery from its marginal position with of a handful posh English blokes making wholemeal brown stoneware and a sprinkling of precious pottery ladies pursuing a wholesome hobby in the garden shed, to the fully fledged, vibrant, professional craft that it now is, thriving in the art world and imposing itself on the reluctant consciousnesses of the literati and media-ristocracy.

In 1970, with Eileen Lewenstein, he founded Ceramic Review, which evolved into one of the most respected art magazines on the market with an international readership and profile. As a historian and glaze technician he was second to none. Go into the studio of any working potter and you will find at least one of his books, if not the dictionary of glaze recipes, then one of the histories. He did not restrict his research and writing to ceramics. His publications include: ‘Fully Exposed: Male Nude in Photography,’ (1995), ‘People’s Art: Working Class Art from 1750 to the Present Day,’ (1991), and, ‘The Sexual Perspective: Homosexuality and Art in the Last 100 Years in the West,’ (1994).  He brought this extensive knowledge to his writing and teaching. Under his influence ceramics became a discipline able to flourish in a contemporary art context. Without Emmanuel Cooper, we probably would not have either Grayson Perry or Edmund de Waal, at least not as we know them. Both, doubtless would be successful artists and de Waal, in particular, would still be a potter and writer but their work would have so much less meaning and resonance. Perry would not have his adversarial opposite which would deny his work much of it’s ‘charge,’ (his word), and de Waal, too would lack an opposing context – his would be a much lonelier body of work.

Cooper was born in 1938 and during his early years, during the post-war era, studio pottery, under the auspices of Bernard Leach, grew steadily. It become fashionable in the1960s when the quasi-rustic, back to nature aesthetic was part of an anti-establishment life-style. Numerous potters associations sprung up, sharing information and resources, each with its own newsletter, annual conference and exhibition. There was a corresponding growth in availability and quality of materials as the industry reached out to the burgeoning market of hobbyists. Classes mushroomed and potters acquired an increasingly professional training. In the midst of this maelstrom of activity, was Emmanuel Cooper who had that rare and extraordinary gift of being able to connect across the full range of makers and designers that emerged during this period. From the most conservative makers of garden and tableware, toiling in barns in the rural shires, to the most outré and rarefied of post modern academicians, producing dusty ‘installations,’ and museum ‘interventions,’ he inspired equal respect and affection in us all.

Cooper the potter was tenaciously 'urban.' He developed a range of glazes tailored to the needs of urban surroundings, in particular the use of a compact electric kiln. Not for him the roar, smoke and melodramatics of the wood-fired beasts beloved by rural potters. I will always think of Emmanuel Cooper pots as either bowls or jugs, but primarily as shapes which could show off his latest glaze like some kind of grand new apparel, a volcanic swathe of blistering, bubbling colour - usually a monochrome but rarely the same thing twice.  Delicate and elegant, they were and are instantly recognisable as his.

Emmanuel Cooper was true democrat, a unifier among the cliques and factions which so often proliferate in marginal subcultures. He diversified the discipline in all senses of the word, bringing together industry and studio, academics and makers, and above all, consistent with his egalitarian activist politics, he brought in people from all backgrounds ensuring that it could grow beyond the effete circle of posh blokes in sheds which characterised the early years, and become the highly respected art form it now is, one in which we can all be proud to participate. In a word, he is irreplaceable. In his case, the cliches are right: it is the end of an era and we  probably will not see his like again, but that does not need to be a reason to mourn. Rather we can celebrate his colossal legacy and build on it. There could be no better way to honour his extraordinary life and work.

The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman: Grayson Perry at the British Museum

'Ooooh how I love those stout German stoneware jugs,' I crooned, leaning into the display case to admire every twirl of oak leaf and branch on the rough brown surface. Then other decorative motifs swam into my vision: bloody Alan Measles again. I'd been had. It wasn't a 'genuine' stout German pot, it was a genuine Grayson Perry, pretending to be one. Round the display case I went and found the ribbon's of text, stamped into the clay surface using old printing letters, setting out a ludicrous rhyme which I no longer recall, but it made me laugh out loud. The best thing about this show is that you often can't tell at a glance, which works are 'proper museum objects' and which are Grayson Perry's museum objects, and the other best thing about this show, if that's possible, is that it will make you laugh out loud many times, and it's not often you can say that about contemporary art, let's face it. Alan Measles, that ubiquitous teddy bear, cavorts with angels and devils, with soldiers and horses. He is a knight astride his mount, standard and shield at the ready, he is a votive object in a shrine, with erect penis with a flower in it, holding hands with Claire, dressed, as she so often is, in headscarf and A-line skirt. Both of these works are cast in metal but the shrine has a ceramic tile at the back, painted with the image of a female black smith. Perry uses iron for most of the metal work in this show- it is the material of the forge, of industry and of craft for industry, a concept Perry expresses well, not least in the first exhibit, one of his motorbikes, which is outside the gallery with a shrine on the back with another teddy bear in it.

The selection of the Museum's votive and spiritual objects is magnificent and Perry's works respond to  these objects effortlessly and work their way in among them, threading his own mad story of the life of  his god-bear and his attempt to establish himself as a contemporary deity. He encounters everything from religious tourism to celebrity, 24 hour news and social networking and scowls at all of it. The pots are as gorgeous and as funny as they always are, mixing that lucid graphic hand with layer upon layer of collaged imagery, dense and dark at times. The final piece of the show, the boat with the casts of crafted objects and the bottles of sweat, blood and tears lashed to its mast, is a fabulous object, (in all senses of the word,) cast in Iron, lyrical and mythical, utterly convincing and deeply eccentric all at once.

I had thought that Grayson Perry's best show to date was The Charms of Lincolnshire, where he created a collection of works responding to a rural, agricultural and domestic museum collection. The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman continues and develops this theme but with a much greater emphasis on the talisman, the votive and the ritual object. It probably tops the earlier show. It's wonderful, moving and funny. Go and see it!

Origin - in Turbulent Times

The Autumn Equinox has brought with it an atmospheric change. An economic year of bumbling along, sort of hoping things might improve has suddenly blown up into a maelstrom of recrimination, anxiety, market chaos and talk of recession round two. Origin, now in the beating heart of trendy art-world East London, oozed confidence by contrast. It hummed with activity which, I hope, was an indicator of people deciding to spend money on well made, long lasting objects they would love.

Origin is vast, overwhelming in some respects. You can't look at everything unless you have all day and a substantial reserve of energy. I go there for the ceramics and, to some extent I notice the metalwork and furniture too. Jewellery, textiles and sundry other weird-looking accessories interest me not one jot and, these days, with limited time, I simply edit out of my vision all that does not immediately engage. This year, I looked only at the ceramics and, for the first time, bought things. It's my new project -  kick-starting the economy.

Sophie Woodrow's porcelain dream-world beasts made an enticing reception committee. With hollow eyes and strangely clad in unlikely costumes, they stood on their hind legs, those that had them, and stared and I stared back. An owl with antlers, covered in miniature toad-stools, a bull with a lowered head and large bow, hedgehog-like creatures and rabbity things - all called out mournfully for attention. It was astonishingly affecting and surprising too  -  a relief not to encounter more of the vicious bunnies intended to subvert or shock but, instead, something quietly and genuinely moving.

Aneta Regel-Deleu had a gorgeous collection of new work - weird bone-like structures, half live, human, and growing but also surreal and anything but human, in their skins of ferocious-coloured glaze - matt powdery pink, bright orange gloss and vicious yellow.

Then came the tableware, which is where I got out my debit card. First stop, Sun Kim, her sleek, oatmeal coloured stoneware has evolved into a fine collection of supremely elegant tableware. I sulked when I found no mugs with handles. 'A disastrous firing,' she explains, and promises me mugs at her forthcoming open studio. I make a mental note to reserve enough money for one of her teapots too. On to Linda Bloomfield's stall where a lovely new lemon yellow glaze attracts me and I buy a mug, tall and straight. She's also developed a new mushroom coloured glaze. 'Men didn't buy my work until I made the 'grey,' she explains.' She's talking to a woman from London Potters Association who's taking copious notes and questioning every potter closely, particularly about sales. Origin, according to Linda, delivers the goods. Hooray! So I'm not the only one determined to kick our sluggish economy up the ass then.

Finally, it's Chis Keenan. Lately he's been making delicious Temmoku glazed work with sky blue insides and sure enough - he has mugs. Mugs! Proper mugs with handles - he's one for the Japanese aesthetic which is all very fine if you're Japanese but I'm English, very English, and I like a good stout mug for tea, brown tea - and I've always had my doubts about blue with brown. However, to my surprise, I find myself selecting a mug with a handle and buying it. Someone had asked him to put a handle on a tea-bowl apparently - and damn sound advice it was too. I don't hold with this tea-bowl nonsense. The colour is gorgeous. Ok, so the Temmoku is a wee bit marmitey and the handle's a bit fussy - Keenan's a tad over-crafted for my tastes but this is proper mug-shaped mug and I wasn't going to pass up on the opportunity - I do love that black/ blue mix. I needn't have worried about the blue / brown tea look. It works perfectly. The tea just reaches up near the rim where the black of the Temmoku is bleeding into the blue and it's just exactly right. Looks like a turbulent Autumn day in fact. Slurrrp. That's better - and silky smooth too, enough to calm the most jittery nerves, even those of the markets.

Two Fingers and High Five: The Harrow Ceramics degree show, 2011

 Image from installation by Cami Cabra and Sally Szczech

If your University and your government decide to close down your art course – what do you do? Well you mount the most impressive degree show ever, obviously.

17 ceramicists conspired to put a massive two fingers up to the head of school (absent) and the vice chancellor, (absent) and the entire demolition government to show them exactly what would be missing. Their work ranged from handsome, thrown bowls, (Jo Beckett), to a ‘shit machine,’ (Lawrence Epps), which oozed strands of clay in the most scatological way imaginable  - not so hard with terracotta clay perhaps, but it provided much amusement to attendant children, to say nothing of the adults. It turned out that the extruder had been carefully adjusted to produce strands which, when cut in cross section, had a human profile. The massed human profiles were then arranged in an office, a London tube, and in various other groups, busying themselves on shelves and so on. Brilliant!

Hats off to Colin Wainwright for a witty installation and for corresponding economy in his artists statement: ‘An exploration of the inappropriate.’ It was too, - I especially loved the skeletal wine glasses. I also enjoyed the quiet two fingers to mighty dynasties of craft ceramics. Jane Cairn’s gorgeously proud celebration of industry, of how things work, of process and mechanics, occupied the space magnificently. It dominated the entrance to this giant, underground car-park of a 'gallery' and mixed effortlessly with the masses swarming round the drinks table at the private view.

Downstairs, clearly enjoying the acres of space available, the rest of the artists spread their work to full advantage. Naomi Wayne’s ceramic chairs, with the words of an Arab protest poem printed on to their seats, were placed in disarray in front of a slide show of photographic images from Palestine – a potent mix of fury and something more elegiac but still everyday. Contemporary art is littered with clichés on the subject of the Arab –Israeli conflict and most often, unfortunately, by artists whose ignorance is outweighed only by their dullness. Wayne’s finely tuned mix of hard edged, unyielding anger with humour and poetic vision is a very welcome redress.

The notion of craft and memory, deployed by Sally Szczech in ‘Heirlooms,’ is also a well trodden path but she succeeded in bringing a fresh visual and tactile element to her work, particularly with chest of drawers filled with sewing materials, including printed ceramic cotton reels. It was immensely appealing and really brought out the nosey, inquisitive side of the audience. Everyone seemed to be fiercely resisting the desire to have good rummage around. Not all succeeded.

I have focused on five of the artists in the show but all of them, produced highly original and professional work – there really wasn’t a dud one among them and there are plenty more I could have singled out. So, hereis the link to their collective website with all their names, images and briefest of artist’s statements. Look out for any one of them. You will be richly rewarded.