Welcome

The Work I Do

I enjoy the different aspects and methods of pottery making, both hand-

building and the wheel. What I really enjoy is the decoration and I work in earthenware clay, using coloured slips to pour as a background and also used as paints with all their nice possibilities of scraffito (scratching through to red clay – useful for making finer outlines).

I like texture and have recently converted an old mangle to use as a slab roller, to roll out differing  clay thicknesses. I use natural objects to impress in the clay, such as twigs, shells and seaweed. Also I like rolling in anaglypta wallpaper patterns and using textured cloth to make interesting  effects. I use a collage of these effects when making friezes, most have been landscapes of Iceland and the Lake District fells. I have travelled to Iceland on a number of occasions and have enjoyed drawing their Icelandic horses. I worked with horses when I was younger, as well as owning my own. I am particularly fond of (drawing) the Arabian Horses I worked with. I work from photographs, calendars and books as well as from my drawings.

In the last couple of years I have been privileged to produce work depicting scenes from the Brooke website, in Africa and other countries abroad, with horses and donkeys. The Brooke is a charity for horses and donkeys which also educates their owners in how to look after and care for their animals. Thus enabling both man and beast to be helped.

Cats and horses are my favourite animals and I use a painterly approach to the decoration of my bowls. In the last few years I have put my interpretation of the beautiful images of algae seen under the microscope.  I have enjoyed experimenting with this material.

I have coloured glazes, blue, green, orange and honey which brighten up a white vessel. I like the play between coloured glazes and coloured slips, especially in textured work. I also use oxides on their own, and one technique uses under-glaze paints, wax resist and a wash of coloured oxide, usually cobalt. I find this works well with my drawings. I also use a Dora Billington matt glaze on some bowls, which gives a clearer definition on the finished piece ie less bleeding of the cobalt oxide. More recently I have entered into the world of Chinese Vases. I use a tin glaze and decorate on top of the glaze with oxides and underglaze colours.