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.
Julian first made a coil pot at school in 1968 and was immediately hooked - and very well supported by teacher David Buchanan to pursue his passion in exploring what could be made by hand-building with clay. Other than what he was empowered to discover at school, he had no formal training.
Ruthanne Tudball is the author of the first book on Soda Glazing, published by A&C Black. Her thrown, hand built and faceted work is held in public and private collections across the world including Europe, North America, Australia and Asia.
Sue first picked up clay during A Levels and immediately made a connection with the material. As a farmer’s daughter, messing about with soil was second nature, but being able to construct and make vessels felt like another level. A part time job at a local pottery introduced her to production throwing and wider opportunities arose as she enrolled onto a Ceramics degree course. She began to explore slip casting and model making, finding that turning plaster on a lathe was akin to turning ribbons of clay on a thrown bowl. The qualities of the materials are similar, each endeavouring to express a particular attribute. Winning an RSA Student Design Award with a placement at Wedgwood firmly rooted her interest in industrial ceramics, and a full time role as a shape designer followed.
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.
Gaby’s current focus is making saggar-fired, wheel-thrown pots. What originally drew her to this type of making was the interplay between the highly controlled form, and smooth, polished, surface texture of the piece on the one hand; and the ‘seemingly’ random nature of the surface marks created by smoke and metallic, chemical reactions, on the other.
Anthony has been making pots for over forty years following a BA at Cardiff University, where he had the opportunity to build a salt kiln and learned to throw. These two things have been central to his making ever since. He returned to Cardiff to complete an MA twenty years ago and focused on rekindling his love of vapour glazing. He switched to soda firing when it was no longer possible to salt glaze at Cardiff.
