CERAMIC MATTERS

My friends Gerhardt Swart and Anthony Harris of Ceramic Matters (based in Johannesburg, South Africa) are masters of design and innovation. Check out their blog for images of extraordinary architectural installations and excerpts about daily life in a very busy studio.

CERAMIC MATTERS - TAGS

CERAMIC MATTERS - I LOVE THESE STILL LIFE SETTINGS WHERE THEIR GARDEN MEETS THEIR STUDIO..

NEW WORK , RE-VISITED IDEAS

Wall plates of different sizes, colours and patterns

Wall panel made up of floating tiles mounted on perspex plaque

I am reminded frequently of T.S. Eliot's line in Little Gidding :

..We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

So whilst I am constantly exploring new ideas, I do keep returning to earlier ones and making work with a deeper understanding. This is always fairly re-assuring and balances the slightly crazy frenzy I experience when trying out new paths!

ZEITGEIST

SOME CUPS WHICH I MADE LAST YEAR

INSPIRED BY ST. IVES PAINTER BREON O'CASEY AND CERAMICS BY UK ARTIST

SAM HAILE

...and then I recently came across images of work by UK-based ceramist Camilla Ward

and found these resonated strongly with the earlier cups I had made and which I am still developing. .

I LOVE the painterly quality and mark making of her surfaces.

MONOCHROMES

I'm completely hooked on these new glazes - majolica glazes which reveal a wonderful sense of the texture and making process of the clay...delicious to drink out of!

These have all come out of the kiln this week...

LETTING GO OF THE 'HORROR VACUI'

Funky handbuilt candleholders with monochrome underglaze white wash(charcoal earthenware)

Candleholders with monochrome glazes(charcoal earthenware)

Handbuilt beakers with monochrome turquoise glaze(white earthenware)

In the interests of economy, we are making some new items in the studio which do not require intense surface decoration...so this means letting go of my 'horror vacui'(fear of empty space) and settling for a quieter monochrome statement...challenging... The exciting part is focusing on the clay qualities and the marks of the construction process, this makes for a very direct and fresh visual effect.

KIMBERLEY EXHIBITION

Vessels relating to the poem 'Survival' by Kobus Moolman

These are some of my fun 'teacup-and -saucer-in-one' pieces.

Back in the swing of things...an exhibition opening tonight at The William Humphreys Art Gallery in Kimberley called David Walters and Friends. The ceramists on this group show were invited to do two somewhat disparate things - one, make a world cup and saucer(hence mine here) and the other to make some work inspired by the poetry of Kobus Moolman's anthology 'After the Light'.

The poem that moved me...

Survival

We who accept survival as our password

accept incompleteness as our blessing.

We who dress in blindness and in faith

do not know the colour of our palms

nor the weight of our feet upon the water.

We who have dust in our mouths all day

have stones on our tongues instead of songs.

We who quench fire with fire all night

know that wings are not the only ladders

to the dark, that heavy wood swims too

in the tide of the wind.

We who accept survival

accept survival as our curse.

KAROO INSPIRATION

My latest work - combined cup and saucer..glaze inspired by Karoo ceramist Nico Masemula

(who works in the studio of Hylton Nel) whose work features here below and is currently on show at our store at The Old Biscuit Mill in Woodstock

KAROO MUSINGS

GANORA GUEST FARM -
'Give us one day and we will give you 250 million years'.
This is an extraordinary and wonderful farm just outside Nieu Bethesda in the karoo.


The Village Inn in the centre of the village of Nieu Bethesda


Old 19th Century schoolhouse on the Groenfontein Road just outside Calitzdorp

A gentle northern sun warms my heart
A buzzing bee, a slight vibration
Not bothersome.
A troop of baboons bickering
in the valley below
Their feeding ground, their land
Where I am supposedly
tolerated as a visitor.
As I am tolerated on the planet
for a flash of time.
Watching a group of friendly field mice
dart in and out of the stone wall
Edging towards one of many birds
whose names
I, as a city slicker, do not know.

Stillness opens the mind
Spaciousness envelops
the spirit.
I, an urban alien,
fall prey to illusion of nature as peace.
And yet,
some of this is true
Physically other energies unfold
And the sky at night
dazzles with milky stars.

I look up there
I remember
my ancestors
and others
Comforting to feel
them watching down on us
And waiting
For our turn
To dissolve into that
vast infinity.
World without end.

KAROO HIGHLIGHTS

Aloes in Barrydale

Calitzdorp rabbits by Nico Masemula, now on show at our Biscuit Mill shop

Old wagon in Prince Albert

Ostriches in Calitzdorp

Klipkraal cottage outside Calitzdorp

KAROO ROAD TRIP

ON THE STOEP AT SMITS WINKEL OUTSIDE CALITZDORP

We are on a road trip through the karoo - starry skies, vast spaces, silence, flame red aloes and much more..mostly there is no (good) internet connection so hence no postings in the last week. But watch this space, there is much to follow...