Contemporary Ceramics gallery and shop exhibits the greatest collectable names in British ceramics along with the most up and coming artists of today. Our distinguished makers are all carefully selected members of the Craft Potters Association.
All of our makers are members of the Craft Potters Association and each of them have a story to tell.
After studying glass and ceramics at the University of Sunderland, Craig completed an MA in ceramics at the Royal College of Art. He was drawn to clay for the immediacy of its modelling properties, enabling him to realise his ideas with dynamism. His work is inspired by the elegance of a bygone era, particularly the work of cartoonists and illustrators from the 50s and 60s such as Miroslav Sasek and Ronald Searle, whose economic use of line define characters and tell stories.
Ian was born in Birmingham - a city famous in its past for guns, cars, motorbikes and jewellery: a city of makers. He studied ceramics at the Central School of Art, London. His teachers included Gordon Baldwin and Dan Arbeid who encouraged skills and making of all types, from hand-building to industrial techniques as possible means of artistic expression. Ian’s own teaching and exhibiting in the UK, Europe and the Far East has provided opportunities to produce work as a response to different places and cultures.
Sophie MacCarthy has always been drawn to random scatterings of leaves on the ground. Scatter and flow, rhythm and movement are consistent themes in the decoration of her earthenware pieces, along with a bold and joyous approach to colour.
Geoffrey Swindell was born in Stoke-on-Trent. First studying painting, it wasn’t until he took up a summer job at the Pottery at Alton Towers that he decided to follow in the footsteps of his ancestor and become a potter.
Simon’s new porcelain collection are a series he made based on his experience while on a recent residency in Jingdezhen, China and the series mixes modernity with the millennia-old heritage of Chinese porcelain. The work features hand painted brush strokes that capture the energy and artistry of traditional Chinese calligraphy.
Mark makes black and white domestic slipware using a combination of traditional craft and modern industrial ceramic techniques, in a contemporary take on Staffordshire slipware. Currently, he is developing his tableware and large functional work into sculptural one-off pieces.
These include slab built, stacked designs for sculptures which depend on gravity to interlock. He is also experimenting with platinum lustre transfers to exploit the differing reflective qualities of glazed and lustred surfaces.
