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.
Peter Smith was once a research chemist before turning his hand to ceramics and starting a pottery in Cornwall. He aims to combine the feel of traditional earthenware with contemporary ideas. The basic form is often thrown on the wheel in a heavily grogged brown clay.
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.
Born and raised in London, Diane graduated with a BA (Hons) in ceramics in 1988. It was during her foundation course in the 1980s that she fell in love with clay. It lit her up, and her lifelong passion began. Initially she was drawn to how immediate, tactile and responsive it was, but it was during her degree at Farnham that she discovered how truly versatile clay is as a creative medium for artistic expression.
David was born in 1943 in Lancashire, he trained at Flintshire Technical College, Wimbledon School of Art, and Stoke on Trent College of Art, studying under Derek Emms. After meeting and marrying Margaret, a fellow potter, they established their first workshop in 1963 in Denbigh, North Wales.
David’s work descends from the Leach and British Studio Pottery tradition, where the aesthetics and ideologies of the East and West ignited a new tradition of high fired ceramics. He makes large bottles, jars and platters with a base celadon glaze decorated with his personal style of hakeme, rope impress and waxed motifs under heavy reduction overglazes and combined with ashed surfaces.
Eric creates individual, nest-able sculpture and desktop/wall-mounted tessellated ‘waveforms’ in various scales, bodies and finishes. Often multi-part and at varied scales, each unique sculpture can stand alone or combine with others in manifold display opportunities. Inspiration, from the natural and industrial worlds, has evolved the work into simple geometries which reveal subtle complexities on closer examination.
Moyra Stewart has worked in clay for more than forty years after graduating from Edinburgh College of Art in 1979. Her work has been exhibited across the UK, in Canada and Japan, and in 2015 she was awarded Craft & Design Maker of the Year prize.
