Just to let you know that the November 2016 exhibition will continue to be open throughout the month by appointment and that new pots have been added and will continue to be added to replace ones that have sold. If you wish to arrange a visit, then you can do this either by using the website contact page or by telephoning me on 020 8854 0330. Bill Marshall large stoneware bowl with hakeme decoration. Made in the late 1990s.
I thought I would also take this opportunity to select a few pots that have been added to the show since it opened and say a little more about them. The first of these is a large stoneware bowl with hakeme decoration by Bill Marshall that dates from the 1990s, being made and fired next to his house in Lelant. Hakeme decoration originated in Korea, where it was known as gye yal, and it is where white slip is applied to a pot’s surface using a dry straw brush. You will see Bill’s interpretation of the technique here and I vividly recalling him telling me that he had tried various ways of getting the decoration right but it wasn’t until he started to use an old brush from a fireside companion set that he was happy with the result.
Leach Pottery earthenware bowl from the 1920s.
The next pot that I wanted to comment on was made at the Leach Pottery, where Bill worked for many years, but almost certainly dates from the 1920s. It has a large Leach Pottery seal in the red earthenware inside the foot ring but no other mark. There was a note with the bowl when I purchased it to say that it had been shown to Cyril Frankel, of studio ceramics auction fame, and he had thought it was likely to have been made by Norah Braden. My knowledge of slipware and earthenware isn’t sufficiently wide to argue or confirm but it does look to me as if it was made by a female hand.
Robin Welch slab built vase from 2015.
Finally, a more recent piece of work is the slabbed stoneware vase with painted decoration by Robin Welch, another ex-Leach potter, that I purchased directly from him in 2015. I have been visiting Robin occasionally for many years and staged a solo exhibition with him at the Harlequin Gallery premises in Greenwich back in 2007, so have a fondness for his work, despite it not being in the style that many associate with me. It owes a great deal to mid twentieth century abstract painting, as much of his work does, and I felt very pleased to be able to buy such a strong piece, as he hasn’t been making anywhere near as many pots in recent years as he used to do.
