David Jones

David Jones is senior lecturer in ceramics at the University of Wolverhampton and author of ‘Raku: Investigations into Fire’. His work follows distinct but linked paths. Informed by his deep and interest in Japanese tea ware, and the ceremony that surrounds it, he invites a re-examination of those so-familiar vessels used for containment and serving. Other pieces link the vessel much more overtly to the human body … Ultimately they are a reminder that our own ‘vessels’ will return to the earth from whence they came.

Raku - New Directions 

Mo Jupp

Following his National Service, Mo Jupp enrolled at Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts where he was taught by Hans Coper, Lucie Rie and Colin Pearson. He then went on to pursue his vocation in ceramics after further training at the Royal College of Art where he studied under David Queensbury. After leaving the RCA Mo held part-time lectureships at Farnham, Bristol Polytechnic, Bath Academy and the Polytechnic of Central London in Harrow as well as being a visiting lecturer in almost every art school in this country and abroad. His distinctive figurative sculpture has been selected for numerous solo and group exhibitions and collections including Sotheby’s, Galerie Besson, the Crafts Council in London and the Sainsbury Centre at the University of East Anglia. He has work in many museums as well as in the permanent collection of the V&A. ‘I have tried to be true to my vision of ceramics as an art form. I make with intention, to make clear an idea. To be awkward I sometimes see domestic ware in the same light.’

Peter Lane

Mainly porcelain vessel forms (with some in stoneware or earthenware). Work currently available from: Candover Gallery, Alresford, Hampshire Derek Topp Gallery, Rowsley, Derbyshire Old Bakehouse Gallery, Fishbourne, Chichester, West Sussex Contemporary Ceramics, Marshall Street, London. Rufford Craft Centre, Rufford Country Park, Nottinghamshire. Dexterity, Ambleside, Cumbria Mid-Cornwall Galleries, Par, Cornwall Terra Keramiek, Delft, Holland. May be available for lectures, demonstrations and workshops from time to time.

Raku - New Directions 

Jayne Lucas

Jayne Lucas became resident artist at Torquil Pottery in Henley-in-Arden in 1997 after completing a Fine Arts degree course at Chichester University. At Chichester she concentrated on combining the textural effects of various handmade papers with the visual appeal of landscapes. Now combining her ideas with the unique characteristics and properties that clay offers, she creates her pieces in the permanent medium of ceramics. The wall pieces and sculptural vessels are made from a blended mixture of recycled shredded paper and white stoneware clay. The paper clay can be ripped and torn creating irregular textural edges, and drawn or embossed as normal paper. She uses a subtle earthy palette of glazes and oxides to represent a relationship between line and form through a combination of mark-making and layering effects.

Alasdair MacDonell

I first became interested in clay as an expressive material as an adolescent. I collected handmade domestic ware, mostly from the Leach Pottery. However it was not until I started working with children that my interest developed to make on my own behalf. Having taught art, design and ceramics for many years – at the same time selling my own work through Sheila Harrison Fine Art, in Jermyn Street, London – it took an epic 10,000 mile journey through USA selling my work in 1991 to encourage me to ‘take the plunge’ and make professionally. Despite receiving a British Council Award to teach in USA. I decided to leave teaching and set up my first full time studio in a semi-derelict house in Bath. My work has always been inspired by pattern and texture – the face forms being vehicles for this. Masks in particular have a fascination. The artist Barry Burrows said of masks, ‘They have a sort of power. There is a darkness behind the eye-holes. They are human in one way, yet in-human. We look at the eyes to confirm humanity, but they are absent. The mask hides hints at something more terrible, which isn’t revealed.’ The textures are collected from discarded scrap and waste. I have around 1000 moulds in my studio; squashed tins, mesh, breakfast cereals, road-killed frogs, fish – an eclectic mix indeed. Having such a large resource ensures that each piece of work is unique. The biscuit fired clay is washed with combinations of metal oxides – cobalt, copper and iron. I use one basic glaze applied thinly and fired to cone 8 (1260’).I use five different clays – from fine to course hand building, depending on the scale of the item. It is this that helps to make pieces look so different from each other in the finish.