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political pottery

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wobbly shelf or shard luck?

Last week I walked into the studio and slammed the door behind me. There was a resounding crash. I knew then that I should have repaired the wobbly shelf that held stacks of three legged bowls. However, all potters develop a protective skin that steers them away from howling at the moon, so I swept it all up.

beyond glueing

I hope the night of March 28th is clear and cloudless because this month’s full moon, called the Full Worm Moon, is a “Supermoon”, the nickname given to a full moon when it’s closest to our planet. It’s named the Worm Moon due to the softening of the ground that typically happens in the spring that allows earthworms to emerge. And I couldn’t resist bringing worms into the blog again.

supermoon

But March in the UK is usually associated with the yellow splash of colour that daffodils provide, and we rather take them for granted.  I didn’t know that the word derives from “asphodel”, a variant of Middle English affodil, from Latin asphodelus.

daffs

Yes, we Brits do go on about our daffodils, but we’re not the only ones. They are also valued in China. They bloom around Chinese New Year, and symbolize good luck, prosperity, and good fortune. If the flowers bloom exactly on New Year’s Day, it means that you will have good luck for the entire year. The Feng Shui three legged Money Toad will also bring luck – in fact all things three legged are a good thing, unless they are on a wobbly shelf.

three legs = good luck

Now that we’re talking about China, I can remind you that this is a ceramics blog and that porcelain developed in China and exported to Europe was so named after its country of origin. Porcelain and china, by the way, are fired at a higher temperature than stoneware, which is what I use, but are made of a finer particle clay, which results in a thinner construction and more translucent body.

willow pattern story

So, still with China, many of you will be familiar with The Willow pattern. It is a distinctive and elaborate chinoiserie pattern popular at the end of the 18th century in England when, in its standard form, it was developed by ceramic artists adapting motifs inspired by fashionable hand-painted blue and white wares imported from China. Part of the marketing ploy, claims Spiro (in charge of Marketing at Peter Arscott Ceramics), was to come up with a good story to sell it.

the Duke arrives in his boat

This is the story: once there was a wealthy Mandarin, who had a beautiful daughter. She fell in love with her father’s accounting assistant, angering her father. He dismissed the young man and built a high fence around his house to keep the lovers apart. The Mandarin was planning for his daughter to marry a powerful Duke. The Duke arrived by boat to claim his bride.

the lovers escape, Dad with whip in hand

On the eve of the daughter’s wedding, the young accountant, disguised as a servant, slipped into the palace unnoticed. As the lovers escaped, the alarm was raised. They ran over a bridge, chased by the Mandarin, whip in hand, though it looks more like a ball and chain.

the lovers transformed

They eventually escaped on the Duke’s ship to the safety of a secluded island, where they lived happily for years. But one day, the Duke learned of their refuge. He sent soldiers, who captured the lovers and put them to death. The gods, moved by their plight, transformed the lovers into a pair of doves

protest vase

I decided I would give the traditional pattern a more up-to-date interpretation. My visit to Hong Kong three years ago was an eye opener, and I enjoyed the vibrancy and energy of the place – click here to visit the blog – so with the suppression of free expression and democracy in Hong Kong and the repression of Uyghurs in Xinjiang in mind, I made a willow pattern protest vase, since I feel strongly about the issue, and I am a potter. Instead of the doves, two helicopters, instead of the lovers escaping over the bridge, prisoners with guards. You get the idea :

Confucius said that an oppressive government is more to be feared than a tiger.

And Confucius did not say the following:

 “Man who keeps both feet firmly planted on ground has trouble putting on pants.”

zaijian – 再见 (Goodbye)

The jumble vases of Mud Month

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panoramic view from Bradlow Knoll

Apologies for the brevity of this month’s blog, which like the month of February itself, seems shorter than others and lacking a defined personality. Unfair really. After all, had it retained its original Old English name of Kale-monath it would be forever associated with brassica as Cabbage Month, which we can assume was the daily culinary highlight for the medieval English but must have been an off-putting addition to the domestic winter fug within.

muddy path

The other Old English name was Solmonath, which literally means “mud month.” Whichever way you look at it, February does not come out smelling of roses, until the Romans arrived and thankfully renamed it . So, thank you Romans. They named it after the festival of purification called Februa, during which people were ritually washed.

jumble vase

Three facts about February: in Welsh, February is sometimes known as “y mis bach” which means “little month.” It  is the only month where it’s possible to go the entire time without having a full moon.  February frequently occurs in lists of the most commonly misspelt words in the English language

dinosaur legs

However, Frith Wood. It was a cold day, as you can probably tell by the images, and my powers of observation were subdued. The only thing that drew me out of my reverie was the appearance of two giant dinosaur legs wearing green socks. The “green socks” of moss around the two tree trunks struck me as strange. The moss seems to only grow to a certain height before it applies the brakes and comes to a dead halt: “this far and no more”. Possible explanation? The air within 60 centimetres of the ground is moist because water is constantly evaporating from the ground, so moss, lazy like everybody else, just hunkers down and laps it up. Anybody with a better or more scientific explanation please tell us.

another jumble vase

So, to ceramics (about time, says Spiro). Two larger-than-usual vases came out of the kiln this month, and they do look different. They are part of a series called “jumble vases”, made from stoneware slab-rolled and cut into different shapes which are then applied to each other in such a way that the final piece looks as if it’s made from five or six different vases.

jumble vase showing its decals

After the piece is bisque-fired, each “fragment” is hand painted, then the whole piece is dipped in transparent glaze and fired at the usual 1275 degrees. When it comes out, the areas that have been deliberately left blank then have decals applied. These are fine transparent designs which are soaked in water then carefully placed on the glazed surface. Then the vase goes back into the kiln and fired to 800 degrees.

jumble vase 2

They are sculptural, visually arresting, but also practical, since you can fill them with water and put plants (or other things) in them.

things to put in a jumble vase

Lastly, if you’ve ever heard of flash-fiction (a self-contained story under six hundred words, in this case) and you are interested enough, you can read one of my stories at 365 Tomorrows by clicking here. They are an online site publishing science fiction in all its incarnations, from hard sci-fi to cyberpunk and beyond.

cyberpunk (benign)

Spring is around the corner, snowdrops have appeared, crocuses are out, next the daffs, and then it’s Summer. Antio sas, as Spiro the Greek says.

crocus sativus

worm grunting

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May Hill hovering on the horizon

The fitter your legs, the fitter your mind. This is what I told myself as I slogged up Bradlow Hill to my favourite viewing spot one harsh cold morning last week. It’s good for you, colder temperatures help people think clearly, people perform tasks better. What’s more, people are less inclined to tackle cognitive problems in the summer, as opposed to winter, because the warm weather uses more glucose that’s needed for mental processes.

the slog uphill

Yes, a long, brisk walk is as good as a run when it comes to lowering risk of high blood pressure and high cholesterol because it’s the total energy used, you see, rather than the intensity of the workout, that counts.

frond vase

Encouraged, I tried tackling a cognitive problem. When did time begin? Where does a thought go when it’s forgotten? Where do lost socks go when they are missing? No answer presented itself.

hoar frost

But it was cold. Very cold. Everything was covered in wispy white and the mud, usually so slippery and just waiting to play with you, was ice solid and didn’t try any of its old tricks. I decided it was a hoar frost. Later, when I got home, I looked up “hoar” – it comes from an Old English adjective that means “showing signs of old age”. In this context, it refers to the frost that makes trees and bushes look like white hair.  It is formed by direct condensation of water vapour to ice at temperatures below freezing.

frozen worm roof

More cognitive problems: which came first – the chicken or the egg? Why do men have nipples? What would happen if somebody hired two private detectives to follow each other? At a cinema or theatre, which armrest is yours? What happens to worms when the earth above them has frozen? Just think how nice it would be to sleep curled up in a warm place, like a worm when the temperature goes down and the frost appears. They burrow below the frost line where they nest in chambers at the bottom of tunnels they dig, kept moist by the slimy mucus they produce. All that soil above them keeping them warm, like a blanket – bad news for birds, no matter how early they get up on a cold winter’s day.

do worms dream?

Do worms communicate? Do they produce any sound? My research later showed up all sorts of interesting facts, like worm grunting – which is the art of rubbing iron and wood to cause vibrations in the ground that cause worms to wriggle to the surface – but I read that earthworms do not have vocal cords, lungs or larynx to drive air through and generate noise, and why didn’t I enrol in a biology class, it was suggested, and get a life.

lobe vase

Looking around at the whitened landscape another cognitive problem came to me. What makes stoneware and porcelain white? I know this one: kaolin, or rather kaolinite, a mineral. Kaolin is the only type of clay from which a white, translucent, vitreous ceramic can be made. It is a refractory clay, meaning that it can be fired at high temperatures without deforming, and it is white-burning, meaning that it imparts whiteness to the finished ware, be it stoneware or porcelain. Ceramicists like Edmund de Waal usually like their pieces in their pure white state.

Much as I like the white of stoneware and porcelain, because I am a painter, I feel the need to colour the surface with stains and oxides before dipping the piece in a transparent glaze and firing it to 1275℃.

horn vase

By the way, it turns out that Kaolinite is also used in toothpaste, incandescent lightbulbs, cosmetics, paint, whitewash and paper.  Some people even eat it to help digestion or to lower food toxicity, but don’t try it at home.

bottom mystery

When I got to the top of the hill, I saw that someone had already beaten me to CJ’s bench and left his or her mark. In full Sherlock cognitive mode, I studied the patch left by the person’s bottom on the frosted wood: hmmm, not a large person, and very confident of the waterproof clothing worn, and given the heat required to melt the ice, I surmised the person had, like me, climbed the hill to the bench to generate such heat. Therefore, the person was ahead of me and in the woods. I decided not to test the theory. If I rushed ahead and approached walkers ahead of me whilst looking for damp patches on their bottoms I would only get into trouble.

three legged bowl 52

Instead, I looked at the low wintry skyline and noticed a thin finger of cloud below the top of May Hill, which made it look as if it were floating just above the horizon.

raven photo: www.copetersen.com

The rest of the walk through the woods was uneventful with only a few walkers crossing paths, no squirrels, no birdsong, only the neighbourhood raven who always croaks way above the trees. It made me think of Merlina, the Queen raven that recently disappeared from the Tower of London, presumed dead. It was Charles II who officially decree that the birds must be kept at the Tower at all times (otherwise the kingdom would collapse), and when numbers fell to just a single raven guard, Winston Churchill ordered that the flock — known as an “unkindness” — was increased to at least six.

Seeing the landscape beyond through the vertical grid of the trees, I was reminded of a vase I made some time ago, thus the next two pictures:

view through the trees

You may have noticed that I have taken the advice of my marketing manager, St Spyridon (see previous blog), and have scattered images of recently made vases throughout this blog in a haphazard manner unrelated to the text. He assures me it is called scattergun influencer marketing and all the kids are doing it, and why am I calling this  blog worm grunting? It’s got nothing to do with ceramics.

Brittle Star

Nor has this: some of you who read my verbiage, my waffle, my flannel, might be interested in listening to me read a section from a short story called sibling published in Brittle Star.  Please join us for the magazine’s first ever virtual launch, hosted by the Barbican Library through Zoom. Free to attend, just click here to register.  It is  the publication’s twentieth birthday, with readings by contributors strictly limited to five minutes each.  There will be no ceramics on view, no matter what Spiro says about it being a great marketing opportunity. It will be on 26th January at 6pm until 7pm (UK time).

Keep well.

December squelch

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December from Bradlow Knoll

The month of December signals the full emergence of the cold winter season and, as the last month of the year, it promises a new beginning in January – who would not be looking forward to that?

into the woods

On the other hand, we’ve learnt to change our habits so much in 2020 that, as a result, bread-making, chess, virtual wine tasting, online bingo and TV bingeing may be on the up but to the detriment of other activities such as going to your local shop, meeting other humans and playing golf. I do go walking more though.

mud and leaf

Yes, there is always the great outdoors, and on this particular day the sum was out and the day crisp and bright as I made my way into the Frith. There was no point looking for colour other than the general grey-green-brown hues, no plants, no fungi, just the wet mud of the path and Autumn’s fallen leaves, lots of dead bracken and, somewhere high above, a croaking raven.

bracken

Most of the brown areas are the result of bracken. It was traditionally used for animal bedding which later breaks down into a mulch that can be used as fertilizer, and it’s best not eaten, as it contains a carcinogenic compound, though it is used to store freshly made ricotta cheese. Highly invasive, luckily in autumn it turns brown and dies down. Ferns are definitely prettier.

Cameron Contemporary Art Gallery

Walking in squelchy mud is tiring and forces one to use muscles you didn’t realize you had until you clamber into bed, aching and stiff. That night I slept as soon as my head touched the pillow. I dreamt of trees, squirrels, mud snorkeling and giant stoneware vases.

 

nocturnal advice

At some point, I woke up with a start. There, at the end of my bed, sat an old man with a long white beard. He wore a woven straw hat, so he wasn’t Father Christmas. There was a musky smell of sheep in the air. He looked at me and asked:

“Do you honestly think that they care that bracken was used for animal bedding?”

“Sorry?” I mumbled, “who are you?”

“Remember me?” he asked. “Come on. Your blog of November 2019?”

I searched my memory and suddenly it came to me.

“Ah, yes, of course. St Spyridon, patron saint of potters.”

“Spot on, though you did misspell my name on that blog.”

“How can I help?” I asked politely.

“I believe it’s the other way round. I am here to help you.”

“Oh, how?”

“You’re having trouble with your blog. It’s been preying on your mind, and last night before you fell asleep you muttered the words “hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates”. If these are the last words a potter says before sleep, I am duty-bound to make an appearance.”

“Well. It can’t happen very often then.”

“You’d be surprised how often a disturbed and troubled potter utters the magic words before drifting off.”

I sniffed the air, which was rude of me.

“Oh, I used to tend sheep before I became Bishop of Trymithous. That’s why I wear this shepherd’s hat. Anyway, your blog. You’re finding it increasingly difficult to relate its content to ceramics, when, after all, it’s meant to be a ceramics blog. Is that right?”

“Yes, I admit that.”

The Chuffed Store

“Your blogs tend to be text-heavy, filled with rambling non-sequiturs and partly related images. The last one was all about mushrooms.  I am here to provide a solution. Instead of trying to twist the text towards any ceramic-related narrative, I propose you write about whatever takes your fancy and intersperse that with unrelated images of your work. Each image, when clicked on, will link the viewer with details of the piece, where it can be bought, and for how much. The more images, the lighter the blog. Vision trumps all senses; the human brain can process entire images in as little as 13 milliseconds.”

Jewel Street

“Wow. You’re quite media savvy for a third century Greek monk. I suppose once you get to Heaven you absorb everything past, present and future, and take on a wisdom beyond anything human.”

“Natch. By the way, how many followers do you have?”

“Well, seven that I know of,” I hesitated, then added pathetically “not including my wife and mum, of course.”

Jewel Street

Wanting to change the subject I asked:

“So, who else have you helped in this way?”

“Oh, I gave Josiah Wedgwood a hand with his marketing, Bernard Leach too, Kawai Kanjirō, Pablo Picasso…”

“Gosh, all that knowledge at your fingertips.”

“Yes, but there are limitations. We get given one luxury when we arrive at the Pearly Gates but this is restricted to each person’s contemporary experience and era. So, for example, my friend Albert Schweitzer has a gigantic church organ, Siggy Freud has a gramophone player, Nelson Mandela has a constant supply of Dom Pérignon, and so on. Alas, I could not have any of these because they did not exist in my time.”

“So what did you choose?”

“Goat’s yoghurt. I’ve always had a passion for it, and it was considered the height of indulgence in my day.”

“But presumably you can share things, listen to Freud’s records, sip Nelson’s champagne…?”

“Yes, true. Albert is teaching me the organ, though, of course…… for a fee.”

“You use currency there?”

“No, we exchange things.”

“So how do you pay Mr Schweitzer?”

“In yoghurt.”

Jewel Street

St Spyridon raised a hand and signalled the end of our conversation.

“I will only appear when genuinely needed. It’s no good muttering “hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates” unless you have a real potter’s dilemma, otherwise I’d be forever at the beck and call of potters.”

He stood up and waved, then slowly disappeared through the bedroom wall.

The Chuffed Store

Later my wife woke up and, despite my protestations, accused me of allowing sheep into the house while she was asleep.

Parfum d’Ovine

Just click on the images of ceramics to find out more about each piece. Jewel Street is a new outlet you might like to visit, and if you do want to buy a three legged bowl for Christmas the voucher code is PETERARSCOTT10, which will get you a £10 discount. St Spyridon is full of ideas. Meanwhile, back in the workshop, recently made up vases are drying in readiness for their bisque firing in a few days.

waiting for the kiln


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abstract painting on canvas

Batten down the hatches

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With Covid 19 swirling around, we are all having to prepare for a difficult situation, in different ways, and with varying consequences – I’m thinking in particular of the galleries and staff that exhibit my ceramics and who are facing a bleak few months, and of all those involved in the leisure, culture and retail industries. But we are all in the same boat.

ruminant from Rouen made in 1882

“Battening down the hatches” means to fasten the entrances to the lower part of a ship using wooden boards. When bad weather was imminent, the hatches were covered with tarpaulin and the covering was edged with wooden strips, or battens, to prevent it from blowing off. Sailors called this ‘battening down’.

There in the wood a Piggiwig stood with a ring at the end of his nose (Paul A. aged 9)

But I confess I am no sailor. My priorities include getting the essentials into the Covid Cupboard (red wine, beans, caviar) in readiness for any eventuality. However,  it may be that after 2 or 3 months we will be over the worst of it, and though it could be a distressing period  it is also an opportunity for all of us to do those things we have kept postponing year after year. Perhaps it is time you sat down and read all of Dickens, or took up knitting or the harmonica, or both. Ever thought of perfecting your stone skipping, or tapping maple trees, or inventing a cocktail?

How about downloading a birdsong app and learning the tunes of every garden songster in the UK so that when we are released from any lockdown  we can burst into the countryside, the parks and gardens, with a new and receptive vigour? The robin, in my opinion, turns out to be a surprisingly refined singer – click here.

the Trini Lopez of the bird world – photo: Zhang Xiaoling

The obvious suggestion from a ceramicist is that you should try your hand, if you haven’t already, at making something out of clay, but I know most people cannot afford and do not have the room for a wheel or a kiln, which is why at this point I would have promoted a visit to a ceramics community project such as CUP in Hereford. Alas, for obvious reasons, it is closed until further notice but will reopen with the “all clear” and with great fanfare. Keep an eye on its website for updates – there is nothing to stop you buying a bag of earthenware clay to play with at home, specially with kids, who love it.

Dalek – by Paul A. (aged 9)

And children, and adults, love it because clay appeals to basic impulses, the pleasure of building form or shape-making,  – a base material, malleable, sensuous.  The hand is everywhere – pulling, thumping, pinching, squishing, rolling, painting, – playfulness which, once harnessed to technique, leads to objects being made and to a whole world to explore. Very satisfying. Look at the individually expressed  interpretations of animals made by different people of different ages and backgrounds

Waving vase – stoneware

Once you have made your cups, bowls, animals, Elvis Presley figurines, and they have dried, you might consider joining CUP and learn how to blunge, dunt, engobe, frit, pug, slip and wedge.  Potters are the only people, other than children, who play with mud.

This why they seem so earthed and so calm.

Dear readers, pottery is good for you: it is a creative outlet, it reduces stress, exercises the hand and wrist, encourages sociability and generally improves your quality of life.

ochre vase with black lines – stoneware

I hope to be delivering new pieces to the various galleries who sell my work, though that trip has been postponed until further notice. We are not being encouraged to go out and visit places, so may I suggest you go online and have a look at what they exhibit; it is one way to support them. If you click here it will take you to my web page with their links.

a valuable stash discovered buried in the back garden of a Covid hoarder

For now, things depend on a whole army of issues playing out, and on Saint Spyridon, the patron saint of potters. Daily life will get better and we’ll be back having parties.

Bumblejig will hold a party – acrylic on canvas

The Patron Saint of potters

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Llangollen

It must have been hard for Lady Eleanor Butler and Miss Sarah Ponsonby living in Plas Newydd, a stone built house converted into a gothic ‘fantasy’, since all they wanted was to be left alone after running away from their families and setting up home in Wales in 1778. They lived there for 50 years but became such objects of curiosity that they often had to politely receive visitors.

“Who is it at the door this time, Sarah?”

“Oh, it’s the Duke of Wellington again. Shall I show him in?”

And so on and so forth: Wordsworth, Shelley, Sir Walter Scott, Josiah Wedgewood, Byron all beat a path to the heavily ornamented Gothic door of their remote “Cottage.”

the two ladies of Llangollen

I, however, was on another mission linked more to the great Josiah Wedgewood than cultural curiosity, because I was delivering some pieces to Gwalia Ceramics in the heart of Llangollen and discovering that ‘The Ladies of Llangollen’ must have been attracted to the area by the beautiful Welsh hills, the fast running River Dee and the woodlands that surround the town.

Gwalia Ceramics

How to pronounce Llangollen: [LAN] + [GOTH] + [LUHN]. Or click here to hear it pronounced.

big Klee vase

The Gwalia Ceramics is a jewel of a gallery run by Jacqui Atkin, herself a very fine ceramicist and potter, as well as editor of Clay Craft magazine. Any visitor would enjoy dropping in – it is a small space but the ceramics are beautifully displayed. Wedgewood would have loved it because even though he is credited with the industrialisation of the manufacture of pottery, it was the beauty of ware such as the Portland vase that spurred him to innovate.

loop vase

And Llangollen is a place with an easy charm that invites walking about and exploring.
The Ellesmere Canal runs along the Dee here and it is unusual amongst Britain’s artificial waterways in having a strong flow (up to 2 miles per hour). The route, twisting through hills and across the Dee Valley, has made it the most famous and busiest in Britain. The canal is an important part of Llangollen’s attraction as a holiday destination. A marina, built at the end of the navigable section, allows summer visitors to moor overnight in Llangollen. I mention this in case any of you decide to visit by boat.

another vase

You can get there by train, changing in Liverpool, and then getting a bus, alighting at the Llangollen Memorial. And for steam enthusiasts, there is the Llangollen steam railway located beside the Dee Bridge. The journey is a relaxing 10 miles travelling through the stunning Dee Valley to the lovely town of Corwen the crossroads of North Wales. This small section of line, which in its day went from Ruabon to Barmouth taking people to the seaside on holiday and transporting various goods including slate and chemicals, follows the River Dee for its entire length, passing through some of the finest natural beauty North Wales has to offer.

torrential Dee

The bridge over the Dee is 16th century and gives you a dramatic view of the torrents below (it was a particularly wet and rainy day), and the High Street has enough good coffee shops for a break. I discovered a seriously good pastry shop selling something I have not come across before: Yorkshire Wraps. This is essentially a large circular Yorkshire pudding with raised edges which is then filled with a delicious thick meaty stew – not very Welsh, I agree, but somehow it did not matter, and it means I can slip in the one about the man from Barnsley who goes to the vet. Vet says:
“I hear you’ve got problems with the cat?”
“Aye” the man replies
“Is it a tom?”
“No,” replies the man, “I brought it wi’ me!”

Yorkshire wrap

Llangollen was established in the 7th Century when the monk St. Collen was instructed to find a valley by riding a horse for one day and then stop and mark out a “parish” a place to build his hermitage. This got me thinking about saints and I realized I had no idea who the Patron saint of potters is.

St Spyridon

Well, it is St Spyridon. He converted a pagan by using a piece of broken pottery to illustrate how one single entity could be composed of three unique entities (fire, water and clay); a metaphor for the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. As soon as Spyridon finished speaking, the shard is said to have miraculously burst into flame, water dripped on the ground, and only dust remained in his hand. So, good man though he undoubtedly is, it is probably best not to lure him into the Gwalia gallery

Arscott Ceramics goes pannaging

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Lord Lyons

“If you’re given champagne at lunch, there’s a catch somewhere”, said one of the great diplomats of 19th century Britain, Lord Lyons, a man who loved gastronomy and agreed with Palmerston’s remark that ‘dining is the soul of diplomacy’, and offered at least five courses of Moet & Chandon champagne at his diplomatic dinners because he found that, as ambassador to the United States, it made senators more accommodating.

Lymington

Lyons was born in the coastal town of Lymington, which is where Arscott Ceramics was heading with a delivery for the Coastal Gallery. It turns out that it is also the birthplace of  Ben Ainslie, Britain’s foremost competitive sailor, and the singer Birdy. The things one learns.

Landscape vase

To get to Lymington one has to drive through the New Forest, one of the largest remaining tracts of unenclosed pastureland, heathland and forest in Southern England and proclaimed a royal forest by William the Conqueror way back in the 11th century.

Vase 3

Pre-existing rights of common pasture are still recognised today and are enforced by official verderers, and Commoners’ cattle, ponies and donkeys roam throughout the open heath and much of the woodland. It is largely their grazing that maintains the open character of the Forest. They are also frequently seen straying into the Forest villages, shops and pubs (horse walks into a bar. “Hey!” says the bartender, “You read my mind” says the horse). The New Forest pony is one of the indigenous horse breeds of the British Isles and most of the Forest ponies are of this breed, but there are also some Shetlands and their crossbreeds.

Brusher Mills

It remains a habitat for many rare birds and mammals. All three British native species of snake inhabit the Forest. The adder, the grass snake and the rare smooth snake. It was mainly adders which were caught by Brusher Mills (1840–1905), the “New Forest Snake Catcher”. He caught many thousands in his lifetime, sending some to London Zoo as food for their animals. You can see Brusher’s grave in St Nicholas’ Church, Brockenhurst, where villagers paid for a marble headstone to mark his final resting place. It does not say how he died.

salt marshes outside Lymington – Isle of Wight on horizon

A quick watercolour of the salt marshes outside Lymington was affected by blustery winds blowing the easel down and by an irrational awareness of the possibility of any three of these species of snake having an opinion on landscape art – all British snakes are now legally protected, and so the New Forest snakes are no longer caught and it logically follows that there must be many more of them lurking in bushes nowadays.

porcus beatus

One or two of the ceramic pieces rattled around in their boxes as the car suddenly braked to avoid running over a pig. Yes, a pig. In fact there were various small porkers rooting around on the edge of the road and it turns out that it is not an uncommon sight to see pigs roaming in the autumn months. Pannage is the practice of releasing domestic pigs into a forest to eat fallen acorns and other nuts. Acorns are poisonous in large quantities to cattle and ponies and can lead to cholic whereas piggies spit out the toxic skins and enjoy eating the acorns. Pannage: late Middle English: from Old French pasnage, from medieval Latin pastionaticum, from pastio(n- ) ‘pasturing’, from the verb pascere ‘to feed’.

Up to 600 pigs and piglets will work their way through the forest but must be fitted with a ring through their nose which still enables them to forage through leaf litter and surface vegetation but stops them from rooting into the ground with their snouts causing damage to the Forest.

Those of you who have been following this blog since the start will know that pigs are often brought up because of their link to ceramics, and this blog is no exception. Yes, the word “porcelain” is derived from the Italian porcellana which translates as cowrie shell and refers to porcelain’s similarly smooth surface. Porcella means little pig, which describes the small plump shape of the cowrie.

Klee vase

Which is the point of this blog, of course, to tell you about Arscott Ceramics and what is new. The stoneware pieces seen in these images can all be inspected at the Coastal Gallery in Lymington, a small but wonderful gallery run by Stewart and Bev. Do pay them a visit and combine the experience with a walk into town, perhaps a dip in the Sea Water Baths (the oldest lido in the country) and, to recover, a stiff drink at the quayside where you can sit and gaze across the harbour at the UK’s most expensive coastal real estate, Sandbanks. Finish it off with a slow drive through the New Forest.

Man walks into a bar with a pig under his arms.

“Where did you get that disgusting creature?” asks the barman.

“I won him in a raffle” replies the pig.

loop bottle

A Stoneware Wolf in a China Shop

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towards Paincastle

Delivering ceramics is a way to get to know a country. I found myself in the car, ceramic pieces carefully packed in boxes at the back, on a narrow road in the Welsh countryside of Powys, marooned in a sea of wool as a flock of sheep was driven to an adjacent field by two men and a woman. It was warm enough to have the windows open and as the woman walked by, I asked her what breed they were (the sheep, not the people). “Badger Face Welsh Mountain” was the reply. I nodded sagely, as if I knew my sheep.

green vs brown

The countryside I was driving through was an upland area above the Wye River and I was on my way to Erwood but had allowed the satnav to dictate terms, so instead of going the direct way, I was doing the “picturesque” route via Paincastle, which meant dealing with slow, winding, single track lanes in an undulating landscape,  but it also presented me with the unexpected opportunity to enjoy a rural backdrop that seems little touched by man…. until you realize that the place owes its personality to the sheep that graze it and the farmers that have shaped it through the ages. On this particular early Spring morning the sky was bright and clear, and the green was taking over from the Winter grey and the brown bracken. Clean air and only a whiff of sheep.

clean air

inside one of the Erwood carriages

Erwood itself is tiny but used to have its own train station until 1962. Nowadays, three railway carriages from the 1880s mark the spot, and form part of the largest privately-run contemporary applied arts gallery in Wales, the Erwood Station Gallery. There’s even a diesel locomotive from 1939 parked outside, a restored Fowler 0-6-0 engine. It is only a few yards from the Wye river, and attracts not only anglers, but also walkers and cyclists.

Fowler 0-6-0

A stone’s throw from Erwood is the village of Crickadarn, which was the remote “East Proctor” in the cult film “An American Werewolf in London”. The gory scenes on the lonely moors with the rampant lycanthrope feasting on Badger Face Welsh were all shot in the nearby Black Mountains, but a Stoneware Wolf (yes, sorry) would undoubtedly calm down at the site of the ceramics on offer at the Erwood Station Gallery. Unless there is a full moon, in which case there would be little chance of protecting the fabulous pieces on show from any lupine loss of control.

Werewolf thrilled at having found an Arscott ceramic

By the way, if you have recently developed a craving for raw meat and a sudden fear of water, have begun ripping your clothes off during a full moon, have a unibrow across your forehead, find yourself screaming with anger when it’s nothing to do with Brexit, then you may well be a werewolf. Click here to see what happens during a full moon – warning: remember it’s all pretend.

Some of the pieces on view at the gallery:

fish vase

ivy vase

Following your visit to Erwood you may well want to have a meal, in which case Hay-on-Wye is 20 minutes away by car. There you could spend a whole day just browsing in the bookshops for which it is famous, visiting the Erwood sister gallery, the Lion Street gallery, mainly showing the work of Welsh artists, or prowling around the open market (Thursdays only). Or you can hire a canoe and paddle down the Wye – if you are lucky you will catch sight of a flash of brilliant blue and green dropping into the water. A kingfisher.

early morning River Wye

Worcester’s ceramics, swans and sauce.

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Arscott at the Bevere Gallery

You would not normally associate the city of Worcester (pronounced Wuster) with the pong of rotting fish and other ingredients, but it is thanks to a certain Lord Sandys in the 1830s that two local chemists, John Wheeley Lea and William Henry Perrins were approached  and paid to come up with an anchovy-based sauce that the former had tasted in India and which he wanted to have made. However, it was deemed to be a disappointing flop and abandoned in a barrel, only to be rediscovered many months later and, to everyone’s surprise, the taste had mellowed into what we know as Worcestershire Sauce. To this day, the ingredients are allowed to ‘mature’ for 18 months before being blended and bottled in Worcester.

Best in a Bloody Mary

Those of you unfamiliar with this dark brown liquid will want to know what you do with it. Well, I like to sprinkle it into the mincemeat when a making Cottage Pie. Or Spaghetti Bolognaise: pour it in to the mince whilst it is simmering away and add a nice big splash just before you serve it up.  The company suggests a splash Worcestershire sauce in your baked beans, or your fish and chips, even in your green salad. They seem to imply that it goes with pretty much anything, but I would personally keep it well away from, say, bananas, or ice cream, or Spotted Dick. Whatever you do, do not sprinkle it into your single malt whisky, but a drop or two in a Bloody Mary is a must. Above is a picture of the sauce; the watch strap is not a Rolex but a cheap one I bought locally. I wouldn’t want you to think that I’m making a fortune out of my ceramics

Worcester Cathedral from the river

I expect you know why I’m going on about Worcester – I was delivering ceramics to the Bevere Gallery, which meant driving on the bridge over the River Severn into the city with the Cathedral sitting impressively over the dark water away to the right. The bright white specks floating about in the almost Worcester Sauce – coloured river are swans, which are always here because for many years the area between the railway viaduct and the Worcester Cathedral Ferry has been designated as a Swan Sanctuary. There is now a large and healthy population of Mute Swans on the water. Fishing in this area is banned and the swans are supported by a number of organisations including the City Council. The local Tourist Board extols “the natural beauty and general friendliness of these swans”. Note the word “general” – in other words, keep away from them or they could turn nasty, like the notorious one in Cambridge called Mr Asbo (Anti-Social Behaviour Order) that had to be deported because it kept attacking people and boats. But, yes, they do look spectacular in the river.

Mr Asbo strikes again

There was no time to stop at the cathedral and say hello to King John who was buried here in 1216 after contracting dysentery in Lynn. John is most famous for agreeing to the Magna Carta, which was a charter of demands made by John’s rebellious barons and the basis for much of our present rights as individuals. When he died he had lost most of his French lands, and was in the midst of a civil war against many of his own barons, though the current consensus is that John was a hard-working administrator, an able man, an able general, albeit with distasteful, even dangerous personality traits, including pettiness, spitefulness and cruelty, which is why he is always the “baddie” in the Robin Hood movies. Anyway, here’s a picture of him getting angry because someone forgot to put the top back on his bottle of Worcester Sauce.

Bad, bad King John

But I digress. I was on my way to the Bevere Gallery, an oasis of ceramic calm on the outskirts of the city, where visitors can really enjoy a high quality and varied selection of pieces on display and then sit down in the café and enjoy what’s on offer (the food is very good). Bevere is the name of an island in the Severn, 2 ½ miles N of Worcester. It is supposed to have been a resort of beavers; was a retreat of the inhabitants of Worcester during the plague of 1637; and is now, they say, a good bathing-place. It commands a fine view of the Abberley and the Malvern hills.

“Interior” vase at Bevere

And talking of ceramics, how could I not mention Royal Worcester porcelain which used to be made here in the 18th century until the Severn Street factory was closed down in 2006? One of its best-sellers was the Evesham Gold series, and samples can be seen at the Museum of Royal Worcester. There were various factories each producing distinctive wares: Flight and Barr, Chamberlain, Hadley and Sons, Kerr and Binns, Grainger and Dr Wall ( Dr John Wall perfected a recipe for porcelain that could withstand boiling water and this discovery led to the fame of the factory).

Evesham Gold

But back to the Bevere Gallery. Informality is an essential element here. You are encouraged to look at, handle and talk freely and openly about what you see – you can be as rude or polite as you like. Stuart and Clare like to engage and talk about the making and creative process. They also hold a Makers’ Lunch, an informal opportunity to talk with ceramicists and artists whose work is exhibited; an unpredictable two hours of conversation with open and frank discourse with the invited maker. They would be very happy to welcome you.

Crouch vase at Bevere

12 hours in London (is like a year in any other place)

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derelict Victorian Public Toilets into a cracking little pub.

A quick overnight trip to London was called for, ceramics to be delivered in the morning to the Cecilia Colman Gallery, so arrival was late in the evening – the idea being to spend the night and get up early.

closing time at Pueblito Paisa

London is an extraordinary place, which is why I found myself late that night somewhere in Haringey eating aborrajado (deep-fried stuffed plantains) and empanaditas (meat turnovers) all washed down with cold Colombian beer. The city is ever shifting, neighbourhoods seem to change overnight from the down-at-heel to the slickly bourgeois, and this perpetual construction of flats for the professionals, the foreign “land bankers” and who knows who else seems to be hitting Seven Sisters, so that the little restaurant we were eating at is now in danger, along with its neighbouring businesses, of making way for another redevelopment scheme.

ceviche

Within this large building more than 100 Latin American traders have created a busy complex of cafes, butchers, travel agencies, restaurants, clothes shops and greengrocers all under one roof, and is a fine example of a city that can boast to being the most multicultural place in the planet.

Relocation is promised, but everyone knows that it would never provide the genuine atmosphere that exists when people unselfconsciously transform a place through the need to make a living and make use of their own experiences and backgrounds. It is called Pueblito Paisa, and long may it thrive. Pay it a visit and try the ceviche.

passers-by outside the High Cross pub

We then walked a couple of blocks to a solid Victorian public toilet. This very hospitable place turned out to be a pub, recently converted, and we sat down outside under a cherry tree to drink and watch the night traffic flow by, mostly double deckers and taxis, and pedestrians of all shapes, sizes and diversity, track suits, hijab, business suits, shorts, sauntered past us.

At one point we looked at the shrubbery at the base of the cherry tree and were startled by the untroubled gaze of a fox which gave up on us and turned away.

the canal, early morning

The next morning a visit to Tottenham Hale and the canal that runs alongside the Walthamstow wetlands offered a complete contrast to the urban activity of the night before. Here all was placid and calm, and, if it had not been for the trains, it was easy to imagine you were in the countryside.

Cecilia’s place

And then the trip to St John’s Wood to visit the Cecilia Colman Gallery. Another contrast: spacious Regent’s Park, the London Zoo, the Regent’s Park mosque, Lord’s cricket ground, and St John’s Wood High Street with its cafes and shops – a small world away from edgier Haringey, but cosmopolitan nevertheless.

small three legged bowl at Cecila Colman’s

The Gallery has been in London for forty years having opened in 1977 and is one of the few remaining shops on St John’s Wood High Street which survived the transformation of the area in the last few decades. Cecilia chooses all the pieces and artists herself and is passionate about the work she exhibits. She chose eight recent Arscott ceramic pieces – do drop in to have a look.

large stoneware vase

On another note, we are all very pleased that CUP ceramics project (see previous blog) hit its crowdfunding target with 5 days to spare. Over 90 people pledged contributions, an excellent indication of the support for an open-access studio providing a creative community for all types of ceramicists to share skills and ideas in a relaxed environment

blue vase