Sculpture & Ceramics
Exhibition 2018
An annual exhibition which aims to introduce sculptors and ceramicists from varying practices and from around the world. Bringing together vastly contrasting pieces from organic forms immortalised alluring stone to stainless steel abstract structures.
See this editions exhibiting artists below.
Andrew Cheese
Andrew Cheese was born in Odstock, Hampshire. He attended Ravensbourne College of Art where he gained a B.A. Hons Degree in Sculpture. After graduation, he worked as an apprentice for John Ravera (former President RBS) before moving on to work at various sculpture studios, the most notable being Edward Lawrence Studios.
"I use a broad range of materials, including stone, resin, wood, steel and plaster. Most of my pieces are based around the human figure, or drawn from nature. These are subjects I find intensely interesting, as the varieties of form and texture are infinite. I often use the suggestion of movement in my work, as I feel that this gives the sculpture more 'life'. I have studied the movement of everything from dancers to kinetic machines, and used them to give me inspiration."
Josette Aitman
Josette Aitman was born in London January 1974. She trained as a classical actress before discovering sculpture.
Josette’s work is normally abstract. She works mainly in clay and porcelain but also uses mixed mediums in her work.
Josette takes commissions and some of her work can be cast in bronze or resin.
Michal Elazar Zur
"I live and work in Alon HaGalil, a small village near Nazareth, Israel. I started sculpting when I was nineteen years old, and I exhibit my work in the major cities of Israel: Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Haifa.
As part of my Graduate Degree in Physical Therapy, I studied and explored Human Anatomy and Biomechanics. In 2017, the Israeli Painters and Sculptors Association (North Branch) awarded me for my sculpture Farewell 2 (Horse and Woman).
My work is soft, figurative, medium-size bronze sculptures, in a stylized, impressionist style, I sculpt human figures – mostly women – in their intimate moments, sculptures of people on a journey, and figures depicting the bond between human and horses, as a metaphor for human relations. I aim to stress the elegance of the moving body, using my knowledge and understanding of anatomy and physical movement. I chose bronze to accentuate the contrast between the cold, hard and durable metal – and the sensation expressed through my art, which is generally soft, gentle and transient. Every stage of the sculpture – clay, wax and bronze – I process myself."
Deborah Harrison
Deborah Harrison was born in Yorkshire. She is a contemporary sculptor who specialises in stone. After discovering the art of sculpting she studied Fine Art and Stone Masonry. Deborah works in a wide variety of stones including Limestone, Alabaster and Marble as well as metal. Her work has appeared in national and local publications and interviewed regularly on BBC Radio Gloucestershire. She has exhibited in Gloucester Cathedral, Norfolk Cathedral and St. Stephens Walbrook, London.
Deborah is a founder member of the growing 'Cotswold Sculptors Association'. In 2018 her work inspired the Matson 'Hope' sculpture & arts festival, in Gloucester where she worked collaboratively with organisations to increase the community's access to the arts and sculpture. Deborah's workshop is at Gloucester City Works where she runs 3D stone sculpting courses which are open to all abilities and levels of experience. She welcomes sculpture commissions from private, public and corporate clients.
Lee Steele
Lee Steele is a British ceramist whose innovative style captures the profound way in which the processes of erosion and corrosion change and distort the material itself.
Lee’s career has traversed a diverse path from working at his Father’s car body repair workshop and a stint on the North Sea oil rigs to the therapy departments in medium and high security psychiatric units. Along the way he studied 3D design in York, ran his own gallery and studio in Robin Hoods Bay and is now based in East Yorkshire.
Drawing on insights and experiences gained he has developed his own range of studio ceramics “Salvage Ware”. By combining clays, oxides, slip and glaze Lee designs and creates unique, hand-built retro-industrial pieces where functionality has been tempered by the corrosive nature of environment and time.
Lee has had work exhibited in several galleries in Yorkshire and sold his first piece of Salvage Ware to a member of Arts Council England. He has run workshops for the Leeds International Medieval Congress and the Royal Armouries and has had commissions sent as far as Kazakhstan and Saudi Arabia.
Mark Lumley
Mark has worked as a sculptor & blacksmith for the past 30 years, transforming basic metal bars into fluid human forms, creating outward simplicity by letting the forged steel and bronze find their own shape.
Mark mainly sells through private clients, he has exhibited in a wide variety of art fairs and galleries. For over 20 years he has been making a range of hand forged furniture for Soane Britain, winning the Walpole Award, his work has been sold and written about all over the world. His work and the high demands for SOANE has taken most of Mark's time however his passion is sculpture and this year he is ready to exhibit his latest body of work.
Mark lives on a farm Monmouthshire.
Gail Deayton
"As an artist, sculpture has always been my primary focus. Despite Drawing being an integral part of my creative process and thinking, Sculpture has continually (consciously and subconsciously) pulled me back and demanded me to make sense of my ideas and work three-dimensionally. Having lived in Hong Kong and Asia for twenty years, the interplay between line, form and structure are elements that surround and engulf me.
Sculpture gives me the ability to create a certain order to things and deal with the many contradictions that are juxtaposed- (in our) city, traditions, cultures, and lives- which oppose, but also, interact, weave and collaborate with each other fluently and consistently. The range of materials that I use (stainless steel, bronze, glass and concrete), marry and challenge these differences."
Ben Russell
I am a stone sculptor living and working in Dorset, UK. My work is inspired by nature and the beautiful and captivating organic forms that she creates. Through my work, I explore the natural world and immortalise it in alluring stones from around the world. Memories of my upbringing in the mystical Dorset countryside are ever visible through my sculptures. Often playful, humorous and mysterious with darker mischievous undertones, I attempt to draw you in and give a wondrous glimpse of the grown world through the eyes of your inner child. I use light, shadow and texture throughout my work creating appealing contrasts between the undulating polished forms and course and craggy tooled surfaces. Often I leave aspects of the stone untouched and in their natural form as an intriguing reminder of natures part in the production of my chosen material, millions of years in the making.
My chosen path into sculpture involved first training and working as an architectural stone carver/restorer for many years throughout London upon numerous prestigious restoration and conservation projects. While my sculptural work is quite flowing and organic, mainly free carved without first producing a model I feel aspects of my training and my work within the industry come through in my pieces. I enjoy the way my imagination interacts with my hard earned traditional skills.
Michael Minkoff
"I make wheel- thrown pots oxidation fired to 1200-1220 degrees centigrade in an electric kiln. I like throwing simple forms, large or small with clean lines, I enjoy making stoneware so fine that my forms look as though they are floating. Into them, I incorporate fine details such as spirals, textures, inlay and simple use of engobes that show from under the glaze.
Hand pulled handles and lugs are added where and when in
need. I use a limited selection of glazes which are self-made and emphasize the details I have made in the clay.
My main influences are British potters of the 20th century and antique pots from the Mediterranean."
Grégoire Donker
Grégoire Donker has been producing sculptures for over 30 years. Son of a sculptor, he grew up in France close to nature and has been a student of it for life.
From a young age he demonstrated an aptitude for form and function always trying to get to the core of the subject at hand. Always trying to capture the essence of the subjects that he studies and pushes for the highest quality. All his works from wax model to finished artwork in bronze are done by him to ensure that the concept stays closest to his Heart.
Linda Baillie
Linda first started modelling in clay at a Battersea Art School evening class in the 1980s, but her career at that stage was in publishing and she had just had four children's books of her own published. It wasn't until moving to Oxfordshire in the 1990s and enrolling in various life classes under the expert tutelage of a range of inspiring sculptors, that Linda resumed sculpting. She was a member of the Bicester Sculpture Group for over fifteen years, where she learnt to cast her own pieces in bronze resin and now has work produced in bronze. Linda now works out of her own studio, a converted piggery attached to a barn at her home in the Cotswolds. Elected a member of the Oxford Art Society in 2001, she became a founder member of the Oxford Sculptors Group in 2002. LInda has exhibited widely and her work has been illustrated in magazines and the Mitchell Beazley book, ' English Country Interiors'.
Ana + Betânia
Ana + Betânia are Ana Cruz and Maria de Betânia (b. 1983).
Ana and Betânia started working together on sculptural ceramics back in 2012, in an academic research program on ceramics in the Fine Arts Faculty of Lisbon.
They are now based in Caldas da Rainha, a city known for its ceramics production both in industry and traditional handcraft.
Their body of work is often influenced by Portuguese popular ceramics, but the concepts and subjects they bring up are way far from traditional.
Conceptually, an analysis about the feminine is proposed. Not “The Feminine” as a solemn, philosophical idea, but the time-permeable feminine being, visible through the multiple and complex mutations that women suffer involuntary throughout their existential march.
The duo appropriates a surreal, humorous language, deconstructing the human body (both male and female), so to build visual metaphors that appeal both to tenderness and delicacy… in a perverted, twisted way.
Playful and brutal at the same time.
Liz Watts
"I trained as Veterinary surgeon in Edinburgh and Worked in large and small animal practice for 10 years.
In 1992 I moved to France, there I studied decorative porcelain painting and between 1998-2002 sculpture and ceramics at l'Atelier des Beaux-Arts Henri Matisse, Creil, France I have been elected a full member the United Society of Artists.
In April 2016 my work won First prize at their Annual exhibition at the Bankside Gallery, Southbank. In 2015 I received a 5* ‘Outstanding’ review for my joint installation on The Edinburgh Festival Fringe. In 2016 the gallery Invited me back with an installation ‘Beached’ in which I collaborated with poets and storytellers. Each of these installations has subsequently been exhibited in other venues including Art in Clay,Hatfield; Valentines Clays, Stoke on Trent; Artmaze, Barge house, London and Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institute I regularly exhibit at Art in Clay in Hatfield and Farnham."
