Jug 1834

I was made in Bristol.

Commissioned by a father for a son.

I am waist height.

I am amber and umber and all shades in between.

I am saltglazed-stoneware.

I am a container.

I am adorned with Italian sprigs

Their fine, detailed, relief clumsily laid like braces over middle aged spread.

Cherubs lean on Angels piled on Waterbearers balanced on Vines.

Grapes, pressed by the weight of crests and dismembered heads, refuse to yield their wine.

I am solid.

 

I am nearly two hundred years old.

I am a survivor;

Only a cracked handle and sprig figure have been given to time.

 

Tracks of rings signify the hand that made me.

Rees (or Reece’s) thumbprints bridge my beak like spout to my wide, sturdy, unfriendly rim.

 

Yet I am delicate,

Somewhere not readily found.

I have another opening,

An eight petaled, puckered flower

The colour of honey.

 

Inviting

The tap of a barrel

A spigot.

From which beer, goodwill, cheer and a fathers hope flowed.

On that one day.

 

Now here I sit in a museum.

A sculpture, objectified memory.

I can be touched.

I am touched.

Probed by sticky inquisitive fingers.

Grapes pressed and prodded.

Cherubs coveted.

Waterbearers violated.

Flowers plucked and pinched.

My hope replaced by fear

My cheer replaced with sorrow

My goodwill replaced for passivity

My beer replaced for two boiled sweets,

which unnoticed or ignored by the museum staff slowly ooze across my base.

 

I was made in Bristol.

I am a survivor.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Casting the Negative

How can I make a vessel using the clay bed? This was the question I asked myself when realising that using local clay was an important factor in my work on contemporary culture in the UK. Having found a site I now needed to find a method to make objects.

Taking common garden tools to the site I began to dig a range of small voids in which plaster could be poured and left to set. The plaster void could then be manipulated in the studio.

Some voids were too shallow, the clay bed being solid and difficult to dig. All were so full of undercuts that casting  would be impossible. To erode the undercuts in the casting process would polish out any sense of the site and the moment of making; so how can I make voids with a genuine site experience?

Previously I had removed undercuts by repeatedly forcing a plaster model into clay before casting again. This process gives the model movement and life. However it happened after the original casting and away from the site. To use this process at the site would speak much more of the terrain quality as well as making objects that can be casted. Now, how to create the voids? Using objects from the site appears the most coherent response to this. Objects from the site, speak for the site and of the site.

The Way We Eat Now – Holburne Museum, Bath. October 2016

The Way We Eat Now was a tongue in cheek take on contemporary eating habits. Inspired by an eighteenth ceramic asparagus server from the Holburne’s collection an exuberant table setting was created to serve takeaways and ready to go foods.

As ceramic products are replaced more readily by paper, cardboard and plastic packaging, The Way We Eat Now responded to this by creating permanent ceramic tableware on which to serve a variety of ready to go products.

Seeking Decadence

As part of a project for the Holburne Museum Bath, I am collaborating with fellow Bath Spa MA Ceramicists to create an event highlighting the increase in ‘ready to go’ packaging and a decrease in ceramic tableware. We have each chosen a ‘ready to go’ food product and are creating ceramic works to display this specific food.

For my work I have chosen jelly. Jelly was a very decadent food, served only to the rich and always set in exciting moulds. These moulds were originally ceramic products before cheaper metal moulds came along.

Initially I had been taking disposable packaging commonly associated with off the shelf eating and using vacuum forming to create new moulds. This process responds to how the original moulds were made.

However, I then went to The Georgian Museum, Bristol and found some very decadent (albeit copper) jelly moulds. These moulds reminded me that jelly was about showing off, impressing your guests; so I had to start thinking about how I could make my ceramic piece much more decadent.

It seems from the mould forms above that jelly moulds commonly have a tiers/layers of adorned columns or crenelations like crowns/castles. So I needed to achieve a certain about of tiering in my work.

I therefore started with the basic forms of preexisting disposable packaging and started to stack them in a range of compositions.

Making individual slip cast versions of these forms enabled me to stack and reconfigure the forms so that they were never repeated; a one off being more decadent that a mass produced object perhaps. The results so far, are documented in the following image.

I begin also to squish and crush some of the parts to acknowledge the disposable nature of the original packaging. Some compositions are more successful than others; all of them appearing slightly futuristic. What is pleasing about these pieces is that they can be stacked on top of each other, permitting a range of different compositions.

However, I felt like this method was slightly too simple and a bit obvious. I started to explore about how else I can make moulds with the limited resources I have over the summer. Without being able to mould plastic my only other option was to form my mould directly from plaster.

I used a hammer and chisel and cut away parts of surplus plaster moulds, leaving raw exposed areas. Once slip cast these chiselled parts came to look like rock.

That reminded me immediately of stone carved architecture and particularly pillars – the ultimate plinth. The first four images were taken in Gerona and document how decadent pillars were made. The second four are images of pillars found on the Holburne Museum building. Generally a very decorative capital (the top part) a semi decorative plinth (the lower part) and always a fairly simple middle part. This process of making pillars has inspired me to create my ceramic jelly plinth in a similar style, with a semi plain middle and decadent plinth and capital.

As with pillars the middle sections were commonly made from a series of stones carved to appear as one, so too will my piece. It seems much more simpler to now ignore the vast range of disposable food packaging and stick with the plastic tub that holds the ‘ready to go’ jelly. From this simple form I can create height by stacking and decadence through vacuumed formed plastic and chiseling at plaster.

LINDA BROTHWELL – The Missing

An exhibition at the Holburne Museum in where figures were removed from their marble plinths. Shots of decadent candelabra’s from the Holburne collection.

Approaching Making

Now I have an idea about the objects I want to make, I have started to research the methods and processes of other ceramic makers.

I still remain absorbed by the current trend for chef’s to use smears and splatters in their cooking.

A potter who uses this approach to decorate his work is Jean-Nicolas Gerard. In the following video he uses slip trailing as well as sgraffito to make marks. At one point he mentions that the accident is important. By this I think he means spontaneity, or an impulsive act. An over-thought movement may look too controlled and lifeless.

When creating the spills and in thinking about making future work I will attempt to take on Gerard’s methodology.

 

 

Developing the Ceramic Tablecloth

Hella Jongerius, a Dutch designer, has united ceramic tableware and tablecloths in a piece where she knitted the two together (pictured in the following video 0.48 secs or here).

 

This gives me great encouragement for combining my own tablecloth and ceramics. When clearing out my studio space I assembled my vacuumed formed cast of preexisting molds together. The results permitted an insight as to how a whole table of objects may appear.

This reminds me of Ryan Ganders work Tell My Mother not to Worry , 2012 where made his daughters den of sheets into a permanent marble sculpture (as this Google image search aptly depicts).

Using fabric (in place of a tablecloth/napkin) depicts how we can make assumptions about the original object even when hidden or enveloped. As the napkin remains the one common element with all aspects of dining, creating bowls, plates etc from ceramic napkins could be a potential avenue for this project.

Update: 1st June 2016

A research trip to a Cash and Carry provided the opportunity to look at a wide variety of disposable food containers. Despite rejecting the process of slip casting these containers in Making the Disposable Indisposable, I am interested in attempting to capture the form in clay somehow.

 

By slumping clay slabs over these containers, their forms could be make into ceramics. Paper or card containers would burn off in the kiln, removing the necessity to remove the container before firing. This has been problematic in the past and several of my forms have lost their shape. The other issue is that the clay form may sag once the paper formed has burned away, distorting the shape further. However, this is process worthy of attempting.

 

 

 

(S)Platters

During a trip to the TATE Britain this weekend over the course of some refreshment a jug of milk was spilled (shown above). This spill reminded me of some of the dishes (food and ceramic) on the menu of The Man Behind the Curtain.

Realising that I could use casting slip, I set about creating some organic spills on plaster bats. When leather hard, these spills could be manipulated into different shapes. Manipulated in a specific way, these spills could act as platters for the ready to go jelly plinths being produced for the Holburne Museum. Draped over preexisting molds, these (s)platters would comment on the past and present of food display.

This eventually lead me to develop another alternative method of creating plinths. By composing a range of plaster forms – cast from preexisting packaging – I could drop thin slabs of porcelain onto these compositions and create an organic, freestanding plinth (having removed the plaster packaging models when leather hard). This was inspired by the process of Luke Shalan.

For some of these forms I cut out circular bat like slabs, replicating signs found when making plates. The slab is then obstructed by the plaster packaging models, combining ready to go eating and entertainment dining.

Update 24 May 2016

Reflection on action:

during firing the individual (s)platters were placed on top/overlapping each other. This composition was extremely pleasing. It not only enhances the organic qualities of the spills (something I found very difficult to replicate)  alongside a curatorial element that makes the pieces feel more resolved.

The quantities of 0%, 5% and 10% black copper oxide resemble organic stones or pebbles, which further remind me of the stoneware plates and bowls of high-end restaurants NOMA and Casa Mia.

So, how to develop this approach? It was suggested that I look at the slip trailing work of Clive Bowen and his son Dylan Bowen. I was familiar with the work of Bowen senior, who’s making approach though gestural at times is fairly controlled; further outlined in this video.

The slip trailing of Dylan Bowen (found here) resembles some of the vigorous splatter marks found in the food served in The Man Behind the Curtain. This approach to making (s)platters would unite the conceptual ideas as well as having links in traditional ceramic making. The overlapping/combined colour effect above could be achieved by layering different coloured slips.

In an attempt to combine the (s)platter with the slip cast plinth forms I had already created I started to use varied plaster forms on which to pour the slip.

During my first attempt I poured the slip onto plaster bats used for plate making. I wanted to capture the spill in 3D. I suspected that the slip would shrink over this form, preventing it from releasing easily. My suspicions were  true and despite capturing some great spills, the slip refused to release from the plaster bats. I then returned to using flat bats and even a bowl form which enabled me to shape the spill into a curved vessel. This process is worth exploring further.

The Man Behind the Curtain – Leeds

Making reference to the line in the Wizard of Oz, ‘pay no attention to the man behind the curtain’ this Leeds restaurant is using its ceramics as well as its food to make an impact with its customers. Using that line in particular, it appears that this restaurant is much more about what’s happening out front and not about the chef, behind the curtain. More about this restaurant can be found in this Guardian article.

Where ceramics is disappearing from convenience restaurants all over the country, fine-dining entertainment restaurants are embracing well designed/handcrafted ceramic tableware. Interestingly, each piece of ceramics is matched to a specific dish, therefore establishing an inextricable link between the food and the ceramics.

In The Man Behind The Curtain, the ceramics takes clear inspiration from the food. Wild, gestural splats are mirrored by plates and dishes (a loose label) which appear to have been frozen in time.

Where I had previously noticed that ceramics remained in use when tablecloths were present, The Man Behind the Curtain – a clear example of high end entertainment dining  – has replaced the drama and elegance of the tablecloth with ceramics.

So what objects if any connect our eating experiences? From this discovery it seems that the last remaining link, an object which still unites every restaurant, takeaway and cafe up and down the country is the napkin. (As seen above).

Artists of Interest

Over recent weeks a few artists have either been recommended to me or I have come across their work through research. Writing about the work of the artists here I hope to make it explicit how their ideas/concepts/practice may be significant to my own work.

Julian Stair – Quotidian

I first saw the work in Crafts, (Gibson, 2015) issue after being given a free copy of the magazine. Stair is known for his functional ceramic ware but in Quotidian he wrestles with how contemporary craft is displayed in galleries and produces a stop motion video, shot from above, of people gathered around a table using his wares.

Initially the image is hard to read, but the extending of arms passing or gathering the wares signify the table set up for many courses. In the magazine, the stills of the video work well as a group/series of abstract works. The success of this work makes me feel that a range of stills from Man Only Dines #1 & #2  (shown below) could equally be as successful as showing the whole video. This way the work still has a life long after the moment or making experience has been achieved.

 

Luke Shalan – Slab Drop

This artist was recommended to me after a fellow student saw my work on tablecloths. I had started to set up table settings and cover them with porcelain.

An article on Cfile online magazine (Rodger, 2015) describes Shalan as a ‘process designer who explores the relationship between tool , material, creator/operator’ trying to discover ‘the experience of making’ (ibid). His porcelain pieces are ghostly casts of the everyday objects he comes across. Again the action is the art, the ceramic piece is the evidence.

Ian McIntyre – Jerwood Makers Open

 

Reflection for action:

• art as experience
• documenting the experience  (video/photography/ceramics)
• functionalware as art
• process as constraint

 

Glaze and Colour (Raku and Body Stain)

Thoughts about my work to date have mostly evolved around concepts and form;  I had given little thought to colour or glazing. A Raku session was a great way to explore a hands on glazing method as well as experiment with colour through oxidisation and reduction methods.

Glaze was applied thickly and I played around with various combinations, using gold and copper sparingly.

 

The firing process felt almost like a primal ritual; managing fire, wood and water in order to forge something.

The results were very pleasing, as well as being suitable for the Holburne Museum brief – some works had variations on a black glaze, similar to a basalt vase I am attracted to in the Holburne collection.

My first attempts to recreate the basalt appearance was to mix variations of black copper oxide, manganese and cobalt oxide into a clay body. Sadly my test pieces exploded in the kiln. However, I was able to discern that between 5% and 10% Black Copper Oxide would be enough to create a sumptuously dark clay body.

If a Raku firing was successful, however, I could avoid having to stain and mix specific quantities of clay body.  Raku fired objects are instantly gratifying and I need to be sure that this glazing method is suitable for the work. Some of the reduction fired glazes are bright and shiny, sating that carnal, magpie like desire we each possess.

 

Reflection on action:

• Experiment with staining the clay body and assess results.
• Successful Raku glazes: turquoise (reduction), black (reduction – a lot of glaze required).
• Thick ceramic forms (withstand severe changes in temperature)