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.
Taja came over to UK from his native country Japan to study oil painting and settled in Devon over 40 years ago. He was inspired by so many potters in the south west, so he started making pots using his friend’s pottery workshop. He is largely self-taught. He found that slab and coil built pottery suits him the most. He started experimenting with porcelain clay about 20 years ago after being inspired by enormous blue porcelain wall tiles at a new Japanese airport especially the water-like quality of the blue glaze.
Ben’s work is mainly hand-built, wheel-thrown and altered using stoneware, porcelain, and high fired earthenware clays. Forms seek to utilise and respond to the malleability of the material with work being altered and assembled while still wet.
The majority of his work relies exclusively on the interaction between ash, clay and fire achieved through extended wood firings in an anagama type kiln. However, recent pieces are exploring the potentials of using earthenware clays to bring out the character and attitude in the work.
Helen Beard is a potter and illustrator and a people watcher at heart. She studied at the Edinburgh College of Art. After graduating, Helen was an apprentice with Edmund de Waal in London. She set up her own studio in 2004 in the London borough of Islington where she makes, draws, designs and sometimes teaches.
After a career in social work, Rachel moved to her partner’s home country of South Africa where her two children were born. The energy and beauty of the landscape, and the people, rich in making and creativity, rekindled her own love of art, architecture, design, and creativity.
Carolyn Genders creates bold, asymmetric sculptural vessels and forms in white earthenware with surfaces painted with abstracted imagery. With a 40 year career in pottery, two books on ceramic practices published by A&C Black, and work held in collections across the world Carolyn is a prominent UK maker.
