Ursula Waechter (13 June 2018)

Wednesday 13 June 2018, 7:45pm at Polehampton Junior School

Ursula came to the UK in 1979 from Germany to study Three Dimensional Design: Ceramics at Bath Academy of Art in Corsham and graduated in 1982 (BA Hons). In 1986 she joined the team of potters led by Alan Caiger-Smith at Aldermaston Pottery, where, apart from a few years in Germany, she stayed until 2007 when she moved in to her own workshop.

Ursula says of her work “My work is mostly thrown on the wheel with some shapes made by press moulding. I use a red earthenware body which I cover with a white tin glaze. The designs are brush painted using combinations of coloured oxides, in the tradition of Aldermaston Pottery. I glaze fire to between 1060 and 1080 centigrade.”

For more information visit Ursula’s website www.ursulawaechter.com

 

Harriet Coleridge (10 October 2018)

Wednesday 10 October 2018, 7:45pm at Polehampton Junior School

Harriet started her career as an apprentice to Alan Caiger Smith at Aldermaston Pottery. Here she learnt how to throw, to glaze and to decorate pots in the tin glaze earthenware tradition. In 1987, Harriet set up her own studio near Newbury where she continued to make maiolica pots.

In 1994 Harriet moved, with her husband, to America where they stayed for six years on a farm near the Delaware River. On her return to England in 2001 she established a studio in Ewelme,  an historic Oxfordshire village well known for its fifteenth century church and school and its connection with Geoffrey Chaucer.

Harriet now works in stoneware and porcelain, she has four different kilns and it is thanks to the firing process that the finished pots are so different. 

For more information visit Harriet’s website harrietcoleridge.co.uk

 

Robyn Cove (14 November 2018)

Wednesday 14 November 2018, 7:45pm at Polehampton Junior School

Robyn makes functional wheel thrown stoneware from her home studio in Cardiff.  She received a BA(hons) Ceramics from Cardiff Metropolitan University in 2008 and has been actively working within the field of ceramics since. Her pottery captures a rustic warmth with full forms and contemporary surface designs. The main focus of the pottery is that it functions. The form and size of the pots are made with usability in mind. Texture and other decoration are not only for aesthetic interest but also for function. These either give grip or highlight the contours of the pot allowing for easier visual understanding before and whilst the pot is in the hands. Robyn’s pots are wheel thrown with a black stoneware clay that she has developed and mixes herself. Much of the current production is in a coarse black clay, this additional grit gives body and a softness in appearance to the end ceramic. The pots often feature turned feet and carved or painted decoration which give detail and definition to the forms. The ceramic surface may be left naked to accentuate the colour and texture of the clay body or they are decorated by layering slip and glaze which highlight their textures, edges and contours.

For more information visit Robyn’s website robyncovepottery.wordpress.com

Facebook page www.facebook.com/robyncovepottery

or Instagram www.instagram.com/robyncovepottery