The Madding Crowds

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Photo by Rob Curran on Unsplash

Peter Arscott Ceramics paid a quick visit to London a few weeks ago, in order to go to some exhibitions. Walking from gallery to gallery was as demanding as climbing Bradlow Hill, not because of any steep incline but because of the number of people out and about in the capital. – wall-to-wall human flesh, where even on the pavements one had to stop and queue simply to keep going along the same trajectory.

“Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife, Their sober wishes never learned to stray; Along the cool sequestered vale of life They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.” Thomas Gray. The view from Bradlow Knoll on Boxing Day

A walk along the South Bank to Borough Market for a bit of street food was a marathon, and once in the market area, the queues in front of each little kiosk (the paella queue being the longest) snaked and coiled around each other and made progress almost impossible. This is not a complaint, by the way, simply an observation – everybody was very relaxed and easy-going, and the atmosphere in the city was memorably positive and friendly.

The first exhibition was Strange Clay: Ceramics in Contemporary Art at the Hayward Gallery (until 8th January, so hurry), featuring artists working across recent decades, and examining the plasticity and the possibilities of ceramics, often in a defamiliarized way. Weird and wonderful, ranging from small abstract works to large-scale installations that make you wonder how the artists managed to accomplish their work. If you ever wonder what clay can do, this is for you.

Architeuthis by Zinc Yi

David Zink Yi (Lima, Peru) has somehow created a giant squid (5 metres) lying in a pool of its own ink. To achieve the slick-looking flesh he has glazed the piece with a mix of different oxides. An animal we only ever encounter dead on our shores, there is something impressive but sad about this Architeuthis on the gallery floor. Insider info: the “ink” was made by mixing maple syrup with black ink, and acts as a barrier – somebody kicked and broke one of its legs at a previous exhibition, and this is the clever solution.

Brie Ruais

Brie Ruais (USA) draws inspiration for her large wall pieces from the desert landscapes of the Southwest of the United States. She sees similarities between the body and the land since they both bear scars as a record of trauma, the latter as a result of human intervention and extraction in the region.

Betty Woodman

Betty Woodman’s wall piece (USA, d. 2018) made of many separate ingredients that come together to create movement, colour, and space, is typical of her. Many years ago, she started to create an untroubled and friendly world for ceramics that had never previously existed, and her pieces were often set out in the lobby of galleries with flowers in them, offering visitors a warm welcome. She would throw her pieces on the wheel, but played with them afterwards, twisting, stretching, and cutting shapes, I think, without much forward planning, which gives her work such freshness.

Woody de Othello

Woody de Othello makes vases and jugs that incorporate human body parts such as arms, hands, lips and feet. The exaggerated proportions and the vivid hues of his sculptures reflect his Haitian ancestry and Yoruba culture. They are quite funny too.

Grayson Perry

Of course, Grayson Perry (now a “Sir”) is there with his beautifully made vases – he is a coiler par excellence – and so are many more artists proving the flexibility of clay as an art material.

A walk to the Tate Modern followed, and a visit to the Cezanne exhibition (fabulous collection of his work on show), and also Maria Bartuszová work which is based on plaster casting using gravitational pull or her own breath to make serenely white and delicate works.

Twins (1909) by Marianne Werefkin

Then off to the Royal Academy for a look at “Making Modernism” (on until 12 February) which brings together the work of seven German women artists active in the early twentieth century.

Mother cradling dead child (charcoal) by Käthe Kolwitz

Kathe Kollwitz is the best known, but the others, who achieved success in their day, are, until now, largely forgotten thanks to the Kinder, Küche, Kirche philosophy coming back to the fore.

Portrait of a boy (Willi Blab) by Gabriele Münter

Peter Arscott Ceramics will be included in an exhibition of Oxmarket Open winners in Chichester from 14th to 26th of February. If you pay it a visit, the town has plenty to offer – click here for a previous blog about it.

As you have undoubtedly picked up, 14th February is St Valentine’s, patron saint of beekeepers, asthmatics, and lovers, though St Spyridon (Patron saint of potters and in charge of Marketing at PAC) claims he is a fabrication, “like St Philomena, and St Veronica, and St Eustice”, he says dismissively.

And thanks to those of you who got in touch with your reactions to my story in Litro magazine in the last blog. It’s good to hear your thoughts, mostly positive and some constructively critical, and I appreciate them all. Here is another one called Cornelius Radhopper, which is published in Azure, a Journal of Literary Thought. It specializes in other-worldly realism, a genre that represents the known, often mundane, world in an elevated or defamiliarising way. To read it, click here.

Kiln Kat Kalamity

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It may have been a cold early December afternoon, but a walk was needed up to CJ’s bench on Bradlow Hill, in part to clear the cobwebs, but mainly to meditate on the day’s disruptions and to put things in perspective. Kiln firings do sometimes go wrong – it’s not the end of the world. After a blissful state of Nirvana was attained, earthly feelings like suffering and desire disappeared, and the walk downhill was easy.

the remains of the clay

The main reason that pottery explodes in the kiln is residual moisture left in the clay body. Even when it appears bone dry.  Once the kiln gets really hot, the moisture starts to turn into steam, and the steam expands very rapidly into any small air pockets in the clay and shatters the pottery. Kerblam! Though actually it’s usually no more than a loud pop.

exploding pussy

This explosion was only discovered after a previous incident had taken place in the studio. This was announced by the layer of blue smoke that hung in space on entering the room, and which could be seen coiling up from the control panel behind the kiln. There was no panic, though Ziggy and Spiro were nowhere to be seen, and Thelonious offered little, if any, help.

Corroded terminals

Once everything had been turned off and the panel cover removed, the reasons were obvious: of the twelve terminals that connect up to the ends of the heating coils, three were sloppily connected and had corroded badly, deciding that they’d had quite enough, and the time had come to surrender.

Bottomless cat

Opening the kiln top then revealed that a ceramic cat had allowed its bottom to explode. This was just coincidence and had nothing to do with the terminals, though disappointing to my daughter-in-law, who made it. The original, successful, ceramic cat is modelled on Otto – here is a picture of Otto with his ceramic doppelganger Potto. They both live in London.

Ottio and Potto

 Otto himself has visited Ledbury and the studio and spent a weekend with the two adult humans for whom he is responsible. No rats were caught, he is too sedate for that, but the arrival of a third baby human may have complicated his ordered life, since for years cats have been unwittingly exploiting humans into taking care of them, by replicating the sound of a baby’s cry when they meow. They only meow when humans are around, the crafty creatures.

Moche pampas cat, 7 – 11th century AD

And cats have a long pedigree when it comes to ceramics. This beautiful stirrup-spout ceramic vessel was made by potters of Peru’s Moche culture sometime between the 4th – 7thcentury A.D. Moche artists were great observers of the natural world and depicted animals with a keen attention to detail. Here, the ceramicist captured the distinctive coat and leg markings, as well as the bushy tail, of the pampas cat. If you are in New York, you can see it at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Potto

Early Egyptians from wealthy families loved their mogs and dressed them in jewels and fed them treats. When the cats died, they were mummified. As a sign of mourning, the cat owners shaved off their eyebrows, and continued to mourn until their eyebrows grew back. Cats were so special that those who killed them, even by accident, were sentenced to death.

Porcello scaber

A piece that does not mention cats however, though woodlice make an appearance, is a story by yours truly in Litro Magazine. This is an online publication that (as it says on the website) “sits at the intersection of technology, the creative arts & literature. It provides a forum for new & experimental writing, whilst nurturing literary development”. It publishes work by first time authors through to Nobel laureates, providing readers with a perfect read for those with busy lives. So, it’s perfect for all of you, and if you want to read the online short story, then please just click here. It’s called Carpet Vandal.

Large stoneware platter 38 cms diam – The Chuffed Store

Christmas is upon us, and we are all having to think of gifts. We’re here to help and to encourage you to buy the “one-off’, that singular piece, the handmade and irrepeatable – in other words, a stoneware vase or dish that catches the eye while at the same time being practical. Such as this large serving platter which you can order through The Chuffed Store.

Or else drop in on one of the galleries that you can find on our website – just click here.

To finish off, why not treat yourself to a full-throated Tom Jones cat song?  The lyrics may not be much, but it’s a belter. Click here for some 70s nostalgia. Why do the girls in the audience scream when he sings that he likes “your pussycat nose”?

Spiro, Thelonious and Ziggy wish you a Happy Christmas

From everyone at Peter Arscott Ceramics, specially from Spiro, Thelonious and Ziggy, have a Happy Christmas and a better new year than we are all expecting.

November fauna – where have all the bunnies gone?

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Dull morning on Bradlow Knoll

There is admittedly no obvious connection between jellyfish, numbats and ceramics, but walking up Bradlow Hill on a mild and misty morning, with no sightings of any fauna, not even sheep, any imagination can get carried away and a yearning for the exotic can take over when the landscape starts turning into a monochrome dun colour. The only thing that caught my eye was a large parasol mushroom.

Parasol

Talking to the local butcher about rabbit (there was one for sale on display) it was a surprise to find out that there are no longer the numbers that existed only ten years ago. Travelling by train used to guarantee fields and meadows with bunnies running along the hedgerows. The main reason for this change is Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease 2, or RHD 2, a disease with a mortality rate of over 90% which has all but wiped out wild rabbit populations across Europe.

Red and black vase at Cecilia Colman Gallery

Scientists, researchers and conservationists from across the UK have announced in the latest State of Nature report that the nation’s wildlife is continuing to decline despite efforts to reverse these trends. In fact, since the 1970s, it has been shown that 41% of all UK species studied have declined. This, plus the impending recession that will soon be upon us, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the sports-washing about to take place in Qatar, is all very depressing – so anything is welcome that takes one’s mind off the issues.

Nevertheless, a cute little numbat was not expected to suddenly pop out from behind a hedge in Frith Wood, but nevertheless, a rabbit or two surely could have made an appearance. Why all this stuff about numbats, you ask?

Well, celebrations and events in November are numerous, but one in particular I know you will be upset you’ve missed is not the Day of the Dead, or Guy Fawkes Night (5th Nov), or even the FIFA World Cup, but November 6th, which is World Numbat Day. It is an insectivorous marsupial which only eats termites. This furry little Australian is an endangered species. The first ever drawing of a Numbat is by George Fletcher Moore who drew it in his diary on 22 September 1831, after seeing one of the animals for the first time during an expedition.

And World Jellyfish Day (3rd November)! Yes, a day to appreciate and celebrate jellyfish, which are not, in fact, fish or made of jelly. They have no heart or brain (yes, yes, I am sure we can all think of someone who fits the description), but nevertheless, do quite well stunning their prey with their stinging tentacles and gobbling them up. Some are quite beautiful, so here’s a link to a video of jellyfish that will help you relax.

Where would anyone go to see such exotic animals? Luckily, if you live in London, you can visit Regent’s Zoo and spend time admiring your fellow creatures there. Warthogs, pigmy hippos, okapis, lemurs, hummingbirds, butterflies, and once you’re satiated with wonder, what to do?

Autumn vase at Cecilia Colman Gallery

Why, only a stone’s throw from the zoo is the Cecilia Colman Gallery where you can continue your immersion in the sublime and extraordinary by gazing at the handmade pieces on offer, including vases by Peter Arscott Ceramics.

Green Red vase at Cecilia Colman Gallery

The gallery, which was opened in 1977 in what was then a sleepy High Street in St. Johns Wood, is today part of a bustling cosmopolitan centre, and one of the few places still remaining from the 1970s.

Matisse vase at Cecilia Colman Gallery

One of the pieces is a Matisse vase. Totally inspired by Matisse’s painting, Red Interior, with bold red and green colours applied with confident brushstrokes depicting an interior with glimpses of a garden outside. A stoneware vase, like all of them, slab-rolled and glaze-fired at a temperature of 1275°. Click here if you want a glimpse of the painting – copyright rightly prevents its inclusion in this blog.

Wavy vase at Cecilia Colman Gallery – tomatoes not included.

Spiro (Head of Marketing) says: “You may think that doing any Christmas shopping in November is too early, but it does help retailers and it means less stress as the pre-Christmas frenzy builds up into its seasonal crescendo in December. Furthermore, a visit to the gallery allows you the opportunity to buy that handmade one-off gift for that special person – namely you”.

Since this is an animal-heavy blog, it’s worth knowing that Matisse was an animal lover, and that he was devoted to his three feline companions named Cousi, Minouche, and La Puce. He is even said to have fed his cats brioche bread every morning. Matisse, also a lover of birds, had pet doves, which he purchased from vendors along the Seine.

Au revoir.

 

Mythical Kings and Iguanas

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Looking down towards Ledbury and the countryside beyond, on a bright Autumn morning when nobody is about, and the serene landscape looks like it would rather just stay in bed and wait for next Spring, it is hard to believe anything momentous has ever taken place in such a pastoral setting, until you picture Caratacus fighting the Romans at British Camp in the first century AD, or the Battle of Ledbury in 1645, or you acknowledge the influential legacy of the Dymock poets and John Masefield, or the music of Elgar, or you remember the bold but unsuccessful experiment of the Chartist settlement of 1848. All this in such a small patch of land.

Slanting light

I know this is a ceramics blog, dear Reader, but Man’s capacity to do good and bad is in the news, the latter tendency reinforced in your mind as you enter Frith wood and imagine Nature fierce in tooth and claw: ferrets killing fledglings, foxes eating rabbits, badgers snacking on frogs. On the other hand, bees and ants are pretty good at organising societies and generally minding their own. Just like the Chartists.

A Chartist riot. Engraving by Alfred Pearse

However, unlike ants, bees and other insects, the Chartists focused on the six points of the People’s Charter, which aimed to introduce universal male franchise (at a time when perhaps only one-fifth of adult males had the vote – essentially those drawn from the upper and middle classes) and a more equitable and democratic political system.

The River Severn at Newtown

 

Yes, the Chartists provide us with the ceramic link for this blog, because not only did they experiment with their settlement near Ledbury, but rose in protest at Newtown, Wales, in 1839, which is where Peter Arscott Ceramics can be seen at the Oriel Davis Gallery.

Robert Owen memorial at Newtown

Newtown is the birthplace of a remarkable man. Robert Owen was a self-made man, reformer, philanthropist, community builder who spent his life seeking to improve the lives of the working class. He improved working conditions for factory workers, which he demonstrated at New Lanark, Scotland, became a leader in trade unionism, promoted social equality through his experimental Utopian communities, and supported the passage of child labour laws and free education for children, as well as advocating for an eight-hour day. His principles became the basis for Britain’s Co-operative shops, some of which continue trading in altered forms to this day. There is a museum dedicated to his life in the town.

Karl Mark, photo by John Mayall

Owen was a “Utopian Socialist”, as Marx and Engels called him. They argued that his plan, to create a model socialist utopia, was insufficient to create a new society. In their view, it was utopian because the overthrow of the capitalist system could only occur once the working class was organized into a revolutionary socialist political party that was completely independent of all capitalist class influence. Anyway, I’ve always wanted to insert Marx’s image into this blog, so here goes.

Ochre puzzle vase at Oriel Davis

Spiro (in charge of Marketing and Communications) says “too much history! Enough!”, so back to Frith Wood, albeit briefly. There was a golden light slanting in through the trees and the fallen leaves provided a carpet of gold, green, purple and ochre colours to walk on. Other than that, there was no flora to see except the occasional scattering of Hypholoma fasciculare, commonly known as the sulphur tuft or clustered wood lover, a common woodland mushroom, often in evidence when hardly any other mushrooms are to be found.

The dreaded sulphur tuft

The sulphur tuft grows prolifically in large clumps on stumps, dead roots or rotting trunks of broadleaved trees. It looks inviting enough, but is treacherous, bitter and poisonous, and consuming it can cause vomiting, diarrhoea and convulsions. In contrast, a lovely feeling of serenity, peace and general satisfaction will envelop you when you visit the Oriel Davies Gallery. It is a key public art gallery of Wales, presenting world-class, thought-provoking and challenging art by national and international artists in an environment that is welcoming (and free). Its shop sells Peter Arscott ceramics, and it has a good café too.

Big spot vase at Oriel Davis

On arrival to deliver the ceramics, there was a busker singing in the town centre. Unusually, because it’s nearly always Bob Dylan, the Beatles or Leonard Cohen, this lady was singing Dory Previn’s Mythical Kings and Iguanas, a song that might take your mind back if you are of a certain age. As far as I know, Dory has no connections to Newtown (she was born in New Jersey) but listen to her on the Old Grey Whistle Test by clicking here.

Wobble grid vase at Oriel Davis.

Spiro says that not one of the team at Peter Arscott Ceramics has ever flown to star-stained heights on bend and battered wings, like Dory. But Spiro, being a third century Bishop of Trimythous, is somewhat literal in his interpretations and there is no way he understands metaphor or allegory, though ironically, Thelonious, perhaps because he is a heavy cast iron and earth-bound pugmill, understands fully. He has the heart of a poet.

Small garden vase at Oriel Davis

September meander

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Exbury Gardens

There is a hint of autumn in the air, but only a hint. Looking down on Ledbury from Bradlow Knoll, the view still offers the usual subtle variation of greens with only a tinge of autumnal orange, though large spiders have started to move into the house and studio, always an indication of colder days ahead, and much to the annoyance of Ziggy, whose insecurities make him prey to anxiety and aggression at the sight of anything he sees as competition in his role as the studio’s “Flycatcher-in-chief”.

Autumn leaf zephyr vase @ Palais des Vaches

Flies are also on the move come autumn. They choose to fly high before the weather gets too cold and enter attics and lofts for the winter. No matter how well the space is sealed, they somehow manage to get in, so that when you visit the loft in spring the whole place is buzzing with blowflies trying to find a way out, presumably having bred throughout Winter. So, all power to the spider, and to anything else that eats them, like fish. Yes, fish, specially trout, are partial to fly, as is the chub – all this came to mind after a walk along the River Leadon.

River Leadon – Chub don’t mind mud

The sad state of the river was highlighted in a blog last September (click here), so it merited another visit. It is good to report an obvious improvement, not least because fish are back, including chub, which can sometimes be seen swimming near the surface of rivers and streams, often in large shoals. One was caught, and then returned – a good indication of better water quality, though there are two outlets pouring into the river that seem to contain some oily substance.  As they grow, chub become aggressive predators, eating fish, frogs and even small mammals. Hard to believe when you look at the little chap in the photo.

the predatory chub

He or she must be one of the 90,000 roach, chub, and dace fish that have been added to replace those killed by pollution in 2016, when 100 tonnes of digestate were pumped onto a field and flowed into the Preston Brook, which in turn flows into the river Leadon, and more than 15,200 fish were killed in what was described as “one of the worst watercourse pollution incidents in Herefordshire in recent memory”. The new fish were all hatched and reared at the Environment Agency’s national fish farm at Calverton in Nottinghamshire, which is funded by the proceeds of fishing rod licence sales.

Autumn swirl charger @ Palais des Vaches

There are almost 1500 river systems, comprising over 200,000 km of watercourses in the UK but, in a global context, our rivers are mere streams – being characteristically short, shallow and subject to considerable man-made disturbance, as we know from recent news about water companies releasing sewage and other waste whenever the system is deluged after rainfall (Rain? In the UK? Get away and stap me vitals!).

Autumn vase @ Palais des Vaches

One of these rivers is the Beaulieu River in the New Forest, which rises near Lyndhurst and flows into the Solent, passing through the beautiful gardens at Exbury. More than 100 years in the making, these gardens, designed and curated by the Rothschild family, have a spectacular collection of landscaped woodland, herbaceous, contemporary, formal and wildflower gardens.

Autumn Reds vase

Now, dear reader, as you probably know, a “meander” is a small winding river or stream, and, as a verb, can be used to describe a winding or intricate course suggestive of aimless wandering. Which is what I have done in order to get to this point. The Exbury estate, through which the river passes, also has the Palais des Vaches gallery, a former milking shed now transformed into a strikingly handsome gallery and show area. No thumb-twiddlers, the Rothschilds planned and rebuilt it during the Covid lockdown, and it now has had a further extension added.

interior of the Palais

Autumn Glory is the title of the show opening on Saturday 24th September, and Peter Arscott Ceramics is exhibiting there along with painters, sculptors and textile artists.

Peter Arscott ceramics on show

Possibly as a result of the long hot summer we have had, the apple harvest is early this year in Herefordshire. This means friends and neighbours will be desperately going round offering large bags to anybody they meet, in the hope that this will help with the glut. Other than freezing them, drying them, turning them into puree, or using them to throw at squirrels, any interesting and creative ideas that deal with large supplies of apples will be welcome.  Even leaving them on the garden wall for commuters to take before getting to the station makes few inroads.

In keeping with the tenor of this blog, here is a verse from Rupert Brooke’s “Heaven”:

Fish (fly-replete, in depth of June,
Dawdling away their wat’ry noon)
Ponder deep wisdom, dark or clear,
Each secret fishy hope or fear.
Fish say, they have their Stream and Pond;
But is there anything Beyond?….

You can read the rest by clicking here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ledbury’s surreal connections

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Ledbury down below

There is a lot of doc leaf in the fields and meadows at this time of year – they turn a dark ox blood red as their seeds appear and are easily identified as they stand out in the green landscape. This is very noticeable walking up the hill to Bradlow Knoll. The reason they command the eye’s attention is that we humans find red on green, or green on red, a very strong and vigorous combination – both colours are opposites on the colour chart, as blue is to orange, or yellow to violet, though these do not have the same force.

Doc

Interestingly, blue, red, and yellow are primary colours, whereas green is not (being made of yellow and blue) but has the personality of a primary colour. Anyway, try putting a piece of pure green paper next to a central red (one that pulls nether to yellow or to blue) and you might see the edge where they meet seemingly vibrate.

This is what goes through one’s head when walking up a hill towards a wood, this and “did I switch the kiln on?”, and “how do birds pee?”, and “which would be the nicest if animals could talk?” Once on top of the hill, the view below, with Ledbury’s steeple in the mid-distance, turns one’s attention in another direction.

Red and Green vase at Take 4 Gallery

Ledbury has become a popular destination for visitors recently, or it could be that they are all “passing through” on their way to Wales. Nevertheless, seeing the place where you live through the eyes of a stranger is good – what you usually accept as commonplace is often special when looked at objectively. For example, it really is extraordinary that so small a place has such links with poets such as Masefield, Barrett Browning, Auden, Frost and Thomas, or that  Butchers Row museum once stood in the middle of the High Street with seven others buildings and saw the slaughter of animals on a regular basis, the blood and effluvia mingling with the stream that ran down Church Lane leading to outbreaks of typhoid – until the buildings were bought out by public subscription and knocked down.

Zephyr vase at Take 4 Gallery, Ledbury

Though Ledbury is no stranger than any other place, it does exhibit a Tibetan flute or pipe fashioned from the thigh bone of a human, it did have church sextons who carried long sticks to wake up those who were nodding off with a tap on the head, and it did have pavements made of large cobbles or “petrified kidneys” that were big enough to send clog-wearing Ledburians flying.

Objective chance. Conroy Maddox

So, Ledbury has its “surreal” moments, but few places can boast of being the birthplace of a true surrealist painter like Conroy Maddox. He was born in 1912, upstairs  in what is now the Herefordshire Wildlife Trust shop, next door to the Poetry House on the corner of Bye Street. A painter, collagist, writer and lecturer; he discovered surrealism in 1935, spending the rest of his life exploring its potential through his paintings, photographs, objects and texts. He rejected academic painting in favour of techniques that expressed the surrealistic spirit of rebellion.

The Dressing of the Crabs. Conroy Maddox poster for the first Ledbury Poetry Festival 1997

His creations soon began not only to challenge the conventional view of reality, but also to push pictorial expression to the limits of consciousness. He was even implicated in both scandal and controversy when, during the Second World War, Scotland Yard suspected him of fifth columnist sabotage and mounted a surprise raid to seize works thought to contain coded messages to the enemy.

Party guest

Weekend parties at Maddox’s house drew in a wide variety of unconventional attendees, and guardian journalist Tim Hilton recalled in his obituary of the artist: “Festivities were common in Maddox’s surrealist villa. I attended carousals there with other undisciplined children, women in Gypsy dress, poets, communist intellectuals from the University of Birmingham, and early postwar Caribbean immigrants … The Balsall Heath house also contained dozens of unsold paintings and many photographs of Maddox in the company of a nun. Some of their activities involved a crucifixion, the naked but bespectacled Maddox its victim, while the nun drank from a two-pint bottle of the local brew, Mitchell’s and Butler’s.”

Fountain by Marcel Duchamp

The obvious link between ceramics and surrealism is Marcel Duchamp’s inverted porcelain urinal signed “R.Mutt” and titled “Fountain.” Sadly, this will not be on show during Herefordshire Art Week, a nine-day art trail open to all (3 – 11 September).  Artists, craft makers and creative businesses open their private studios every day from 11am – 5pm.

Matisse vase at Take 4 Gallery, Ledbury. hArt

The Take Four Gallery on the High Street will be exhibiting some pieces by Peter Arscott Ceramics, and there will be demonstrations at 11 and at 2 on Thursday 8th September on how to make a three-legged urinal, er..sorry…bowl.

Three legged bowl at Take 4 Gallery

h.Art has become part of Herefordshire’s cultural calendar, with a huge variety of art and art forms on show in open studios, group exhibitions and gallery events. The vast majority offer free admission to visitors, in locations such as manor houses, historic barns, farms, churches and beautiful gardens.

Back in the cool of Frith Wood, with no other walkers on a very early Monday morning, the eery silence was only occasionally broken by birdsong, and at one point a sudden crashing through the undergrowth revealed the light brown back of a fleeing deer. If Surrealism was an avant-garde movement in art and literature which sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind, for example by the irrational juxtaposition of images, then this was a good setting – substitute pike for deer.

From predatory pike to printed prose: let me introduce you to the Stand Magazine and to Jon Silkin, poet, editor and critic who established it with his £5 redundancy money (received after trying to organise some of his fellow manual workers) as a ‘stand’ against injustice and oppression, and to ‘stand’ for the role that the arts, poetry and fiction in particular, could and should play in that fight.

Silkin

As described by the poet Rodney Pybus, Stand is “….. a place where the unglamorous, the unfashionable, the oppositional, the innovative, the unEnglish, the radical voices might gain a hearing as well as the more conventional, acceptable and consensual voices.”

My short story, Maxwell’s Nose, probably belongs to the “conventional, acceptable and consensual” stable.  If you’d like to read it you can click here for the website, and you can read the intro, though you would have to buy an individual copy (£7 inc postage) through the editor at engstand@leeds.ac.uk to read the whole story, or else subscribe online. Excellent poetry contributions.

Goodbye

Hereford, Hawkins and Hoople

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Hereford Cathedral

“And Prince Eadric and the Welsh became hostile and they attacked the castle-men in Hereford, and did them many injuries. And here the king set a great tax on the wretched people …” (The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Worcester Manuscript 1066, pp. 200-201)

Illustration of a Welsh archer from the late 13th century

It seems that, right up to the Middle Ages, there were quite a few battles waged by the Welsh against the English in Hereford, which probably gave rise to many myths, and perhaps the most famous of these are the supposed laws about your rights to shoot a Welsh person with a longbow on a Sunday in the Cathedral Close in Hereford. A spokesperson for the Law Commission has confirmed: “It is illegal to shoot a Welsh or Scottish person regardless of the day, location or choice of weaponry.”

Church Street, Hereford

So, denied this right by law, I left my bow and arrow behind and drove into the city to deliver ceramics to the Timothy Hawkins Gallery – just a stone’s throw from the Cathedral, but it was a weekday anyway, not a Sunday. Church Street, where the gallery is, is a stone-paved lane that leads from the close to the main square, free of traffic, and with cafes, it is much used by pedestrians as a short-cut.

Timothy Hawkins himself is an artist craftsman who makes beautiful bespoke furniture, and the gallery is an outlet for some of his work, but also for others. Glass, textiles, metal work, ceramics, as well as wood, is on display, and after you’ve paid a visit, you can go and visit the Chained Library and the Mappa Mundi at the Cathedral before going to one of the fine pubs for a drink.

Signs and Wonders by Edmund de Waal. Photo by Hélène Binet

The main square itself is used as a market once a week, and I was reminded that many years ago a young Edmund de Waal used to sell his ceramics there when he set up a studio in the eighties. His work is minimalist and functional, but also sensual because, as he says, “of the knowledge our own hands hold when we make things”. Touch is important to him, as it was to another potter, born in Hereford, Simon Carroll.

Simon Carroll. Photo from Artforum 2014

Quite a contrast with de Waal’s work, Carroll’s is exuberant and risk-taking, and he was a whizz with glazes.

Hello vase at the Timothy Hawkins Gallery

Who else has Hereford connections? Well, three incredibly famous actors: David Garrick, Sarah Siddons and Nell Gwynn, Charles II’s mistress. And singer songwriter Ellie Goulding. And, of course, Mott the Hoople, glam rock band whose greatest hit was All the Young Dudes, written for them by David Bowie to stop them splitting up, which they were on the verge of doing – you of a certain age will enjoy listening to it again: click here.

Vase 54 at the Timothy Hawkins Gallery

And if any of you enjoy your sport, you may remember one if the greatest footballing upsets in FA Cup history when Hereford United beat Newcastle 2–1 in January 1972, when they were still a non-league side and Newcastle were in the top division of English football. Have a look at Ronnie Radford’s goal here.

JV11 at Timothy Hawkins Gallery

Historically, Hereford was once part of Wales (thus all those battles) and there is still a debate that crops up now and again as to whether the county would be better off as part of Wales and not England, to the extent that some believe that Herefordshire has become mecca for people from the South East and London to build their castles in their very own corner of ‘England’, to the detriment of Hereford’s “Welshness”, defined as infectious high spirits, combined with recklessness, generosity, and a ready wit (all of which Nell Gwynn had in spades).

the longest place name in Europe

Two English tourists are driving through Wales and visit the place with the longest name in Europe  –Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch (“St Mary’s Church in the Hollow of the White Hazel near a Rapid Whirlpool and the Church of St. Tysilio near the Red Cave”). They stop for lunch and one of the tourists asks the waitress: “Before we order, I wonder if you could settle an argument for us. Can you pronounce where we are, very, very, very slowly?”The girl leaned over and said: “Burrr… gurrr… King.”

Nell Gwynn as Cupid, an engraving by Richard Thomson, of a painting by Peter Cross.Samuel Pepys kept one on his desk.

Large figure vase at the Timothy Hawkins Gallery

Sizzle v Sausage

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Wave vase

Are you as confused as we are with emojis of giraffes in sunglasses, smiling coiled poos and aubergines? Well, relax. It’s just that the world of our cultural references is becoming increasingly visually based, that’s all. It’s a cliché that a picture tells a thousand stories, but what writing can surpass the photo of the workmen having lunch atop a skyscraper, or of the tank man of Tiananmen Square, or of the sailor kissing the girl in Times Square?

Segment vase

Which leads me to the more mundane issue of imagery and marketing. Images act as storytellers.  You can evoke an emotion by using a high-quality image that can then draw visitors to your website. They will take in the image, and in a split second decide whether the rest of your site is going to be relevant to them.

Eric

Though a long-standing colleague and friend says “it’s the sausage in the frying pan, not the sizzle that counts”, obviously using the image of a nightingale singing, or of Michelangelo’s David with tulips growing out of his head, or of a fat rat called Eric, or of a Hereford cow, or of a fish with an Elvis hairstyle, is not really going to encourage a visitor who is interested in ceramics to keep on clicking. All of which Peter Arscott Ceramics has been guilty of, despite warnings from Spiro, Head of Marketing.

Which explains the images at the top of this blog – visually stunning compositions that have been set up, photographed and edited by someone who knows her craft – click here for a link to her site. Your eyes stay on it that little bit longer, and that extra nano-second may be the difference between leaving or continuing. A post on social media accompanied by an image is ten times likelier to receive engagement.

Willow Pattern Protest Vase at the Oxmarket

It turns out that a big chunk of our brain spends its time in visual processing, in part because images can grab our attention so easily. When you clicked onto this blog, did you immediately start reading or did you look at the photos first? The theory is that our visual senses are the most active because quick processing of visual information would have saved our ancestors from an attack by a predator.

Willow Pattern Protest Vase (verso) at the Oxmarket

A quick visit to Chichester via the M3 and A27 is a real test of anybody’s visual processing: looking out for signs at the spaghetti-like interchanges and dealing with predatory lorries on their way to Southampton docks is a bit like going on a hunting expedition. One of our ceramics has been chosen for exhibition at the Oxmarket Open and had to be delivered to the Oxmarket Gallery, a deconsecrated church formerly St Andrew’s, in the heart of the city, and beautifully redesigned as an Arts centre.  The piece in question is a Willow Pattern Protest Vase – see relevant blog here.

The good news its that the ceramic was chosen as one of the joint winners of the Applied Arts Prize, selected by glass artist Adam Aaronson: an exhibition of ceramics in 2023 awaits. Watch this space. The other winner is Jane Eastell, whose instagram handle is @thepotterycabin_lm.

One of the few things saved from the redundant parish church of St Andrew, Oxmarket, was the memorial to John Cawley, which was moved to the cathedral where you can see it now. He was thrice Mayor of Chichester, and his son William (d. 1666) is also commemorated. William was a philanthropist and a staunch republican, signing Charles I’s death warrant. I think Cawley Senior’s expression is priceless, and probably not one that is meant to convey goggle-eyed confusion, but I can’t help feeling I’ve met him somewhere before..

I’ve resisted the temptation to sign off with a relevant limerick that starts with “there was a young woman from Chichester, who made all the saints in their niches stir…” because Spiro says it is too lewd. Instead, why not visit the cathedral which has a stained glass window by Mark Chagal, a tapestry by John Piper and a painting by Graham Sutherland amongst its collection of art.

But of all the monuments, the Arundel tomb is the best known – the inspiration for Philip Larkin’s poem of that name, and even though he himself said that love isn’t stronger than death just because statues hold hands for six hundred years, we can’t help reading the poem in that way:

… the stone fidelity
They hardly meant has come to be
Their final blazon, and to prove
Our almost-instinct almost true:
What will survive of us is love.

 And drop in to see the Willow Pattern protest vase too.

Disgruntled staff and fundraising

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Looking at some of the pieces that have recently come out of the kiln, like the one above, anybody might think that Peter Arscott Ceramics is keen on making work that displays the principles of movement, by showing flowing lines and edges that we find in the natural world. But it is rhythm and pattern in the mark making that is of primary concern and this sometimes leads to this impression of movement – repetition of elements or colours. We are just as keen on placing spots on the surfaces, which achieve the opposite, anchoring a design, like the one below.

Talking of repetition, staff meetings are held regularly at PAC. One was recently held to discuss stock levels. Over coffee, Thelonious (pug mill), Spyridon (marketing), Ziggy (fly control) and I agreed that there is nothing worse than having stock that is uncherished and unseen. Subsequently, we are going to display those pieces that didn’t quite make the grade, those “not quite right” vases, those skewed pieces, those stunted or, frankly, unresolved ceramics that have been lurking in some dark corner of the studio, forgotten and unloved but which will for once have a chance to have others cast their eyes on them and decide their worth.

Spyridon, Thelonious and Ziggy

Because all these stoneware vessels are fired to such a high temperature in the kiln (1270°) they are essentially vitrified and will withstand any temperature out in the garden. They are frost-proof. And you’d be surprised how good the most questionable ceramic can look once it has been strategically placed outdoors among shrubs and bushes, or on terraces, or on a balcony or windowsill with suitable plants in them. You may even like one enough to put on your kitchen table, but what I am saying is that despite their flaws they retain some allure if carefully positioned around or outside the house.

So obviously we are not going to charge you for any of these little ceramic orphans. No. We are going to ask those of you who come to see and take, to leave a donation in a box that will be left outside in the garden near the display. You can leave as much or as little as you like, but it will go to a charitable cause.

Thelonious wanted any money to go to a retirement scrapyard for old pugmills, Spiro pressed for donations to go to a home in Greece for retired goatherds, and Ziggy, despite our best attempts at explaining the idea of “charitable” to him, wanted to invest it all in a large glass maggot-breeding farm and fly dispenser. However, as the boss, I have decided that it should go to towards the Ledbury Poetry Festival Community Projects at the new Poetry House in Ledbury to help cater for the many communal events planned to take place there.

“What’s poetry got to do with pottery?” sneered the sulking Ziggy.

“The only difference is the letter t” I riposted.

“You’ve said that so many times before that it is no longer witty,” murmured Spiro.

“Yes,” added Thelonious, “you are repeating yourself quite often nowadays.”

“Listen, you lot,” I said with rising anger, “this is all a bit rich coming from a cast iron contraption that can only compress used clay! As for you, Spyridon, I haven’t heard you ever say anything witty, possibly because you are a third century goatherd and Bishop of Trimythous, but mainly (I suspect) because you are a figment of my imagination, one to whom I have entrusted this enterprise’s marketing campaign!”

There was a hushed silence in the studio.

“And Ziggy, don’t forget that, as a spider, you are here on sufferance because you keep the fly population under control.”

There followed murmured protests and vague threats of a strike, which (like the present government) I chose to ignore. Then my wife came into the studio with a suspicious look in her eyes and asked me if I’d been talking to myself again, which I denied. Perhaps I have been working on my own too much.

So, if you are interested, please make your way to Oakland House, The Homend, Ledbury, HR8 1AP and park on the road, if you are driving, by the gate, skip up the seven steps into the front garden and have a look. If anything takes your fancy, take it and leave your donation in the nearby box. The images accompanying this blog show some of the ceramics that will be on display. They will be there on Saturday 16th and Sunday 17thJuly, from 10am to 6pm.

For those of you wanting to spend as little as possible (hard times and steeper bills are heading our way, after all) there will also be some small three legged bowls to choose from, mainly from when Peter Arscott Ceramics used to be “belatrova” – you’ll find the “b” mark on those, as opposed to the PAC mark.

Although somebody will be at home , Covid has struck, so nobody contagious will come out to greet you. A forlorn wave from a window is all you might get, though staff, being  a machine, a figment and a spider, are not affected. Finally, and with Ziggy’s woeful attitude in mind, and because this is a ceramics blog, and because we have had a highly successful Ledbury Poetry Festival, I’ll finish with the part of the last stanza of John Keat’s poem, Ode to a Grecian Urn:

When old age shall this generation waste,

Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe

Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty, —that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”

John Keats by William Hilton, National Portrait Gallery

song of the nightingale, buzz of the fly

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May view of Ledbury

A celebratory walk was needed after a successful glaze firing. The view from Bradlow Knoll down towards Ledbury this May afternoon was grey and cloudy. You can see in the distance the white shapes of the plastic used in the speeded-up cultivation of strawberries for the voracious soft fruit market, and, nearer, the sheep  which will end up on our dinner plates. Land maintained and exploited for the consumer’s benefit, which has made our landscape what it is today. This applies to Frith Wood as well, where dead trees are removed or left on the ground to encourage wildlife. This tree was 57 years old – I counted the rings.

A well-maintained wood.

It clouded over very quickly and started to rain, so it was dark walking in the wood, and there was little birdsong. However, it was not as dark as a few weeks ago when my daughter and I found ourselves with thirty others tiptoeing through Highnam Woods near Gloucester at midnight.

A walk through the woods at night vase

 It was pitch black. Not a sound could we make, no squeaky shoes allowed, or noisy clothing, no flashlights to be used, only the vague shape of the person in front to guide each of us in single file until we came to a small clearing and very carefully sat down. We had previously gathered around a campfire to eat, drink and listen to the environmentalist Sam Lee, who was leading us into the trees with one purpose only: to listen to a nightingale sing.

Nightingale. Photo: Carlos Delgado

Unlike the continent, the UK is seeing the slow disappearance of the bird, due to farming and land management activity, but primarily to the lack of thoughtfully maintained woods like Highnam, which is owned by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, and is a jewel, a remnant of ancient woodland that is carefully managed in order to keep a balance between mature trees and traditional coppice.

Doodle vase just out of the kiln.

Our nightingale sang his heart out, though not for us. Only male birds sing at night, in order to woo the females – if you hear one still singing at the end of Spring, that means he didn’t get the girl and he’ll be a Summer bachelor. Ours was a Pavarotti, with the most amazing technique, and the sound was clean and clear and strangely affecting. Click here to listen, and if you are interested in going on a Nightingale Walk next Spring, have a look at the Nest Collective website here.

Posture vase

From beautiful sounds to irritating ones: is it me, or are the flies out early this year?

They keep zooming into the studio uninvited, hurling themselves against the windowpanes again and again, and buzzing at a particular pitch that keeps you from concentrating. Eventually you spend too much time trying to swat them, unsuccessfully, and getting more and more frenzied and unfocused.

Fl-eye view

Like most people, I know flies have those compound eyes which allow them to see what’s coming towards them no matter at what angle or speed, so that by the time they’ve swerved the blow of a rolled-up newspaper, they’ve had time to read the print. Ok, so flies are important pollinators, second only to the bees, but house flies, commensal with humans all over the world, spread food-borne illnesses. And they are an annoyance especially in some parts of the world where they can occur in large numbers, buzzing and settling on the skin or eyes. Did you know, and I’ve looked this up, that the fly’s taste receptors are in the labium, pharynx, feet, wing margins and female genitalia, thus enabling it to taste your food by walking on it?

Research on your behalf also uncovered this: the Sardinian cheese casu martzu is exposed to flies so that the digestive activities of the fly larvae soften the cheese and modify the aroma as part of the process of maturation. Banned by the European Union, the cheese was hard to find, but the ban has been lifted on the grounds that the cheese is a traditional local product made by traditional methods.  And why not? The sustainable food of the future is the insect.

Swat vase

Do flies, do insects, have much to do with the history and development of ceramics? Not as far as I know, this is just another long and rambling lead-in to my latest batch of vases out of the kiln. I think you’ll agree that the piece above has been influenced by fly-swatting.

Hello vase

From bird song to buzzing to mooing: more PCA ceramics at the Palais des Vaches in Exbury, where you can also see a unique coffee table made with tapering beech legs, the top being sealed, and hand painted with acrylics. Three layers of heat-resistant varnish ensure that hot mugs of coffee will not mark the surface, though coasters are recommended. The surface is easy to clean.  It could be described as a horizontal painting on four legs, and certainly you get a lot of pleasure from simply looking down on it and enjoying the colours

Unique PAC hand-painted table at the Palais des Vaches

Other work at the Palais includes this large sculptural piece:

Porthole vase

And to finish, a poem from childhood:

“Will you walk into my parlour?” said the Spider to the Fly,
“‘Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy;
The way into my parlour is up a winding stair,
And I have many curious things to show when you are there.”
“Oh no, no,” said the little Fly, “to ask me is in vain,
For who goes up your winding stair can ne’er come down again.” (Mary Howitt)

Ruby my Dear vase at the Coastal Gallery

Well, I couldn’t resist finishing off with John Keats:

“Darkling I listen; and, for many a time
I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Call’d him soft names in many a musèd rhyme,
To take into the air my quiet breath;
Now more than ever seems it rich to die,
To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
In such an ecstasy!”