June 2024

I have honestly been out of my comfort zone a lot during studio development and I feel this had
inhibited my style and creative process. Ceramics has always been more of a hobby, my time, my little bit of
therapy.  Putting the pressure on myself by wanting to use clay as a canvas for my artwork has been quite challenging because I don’t feel I have enough knowledge to do each element confidently.   I still don’t.  Am I glad I did it? Yes.

What I take from this whole year is that from one photograph I have created several pieces of artwork, using a number of different mediums.  I can decide to either follow these skills and create more refined ceramic pieces as either unique pieces or limited editions.

I also have a couple of linocut pieces that I can use again should I ever be lucky enough to have a
back catalogue and someone requests it.   Finding images to use for this process, and image transfers is not going
to be too dificult as I have literally thousands on a hard drive at home.  I think realising that my passion is horses
and it’s a subject matter I know well, was a big turning point during the second part of the year.   I have a more
natural feel for the story I wish to convey.

I am not sure I will concentrate on ceramics in the same way next year, but I will do this process again.  Now I understand a little more about the principles behind it.  I would like to explore using different colour slips and oxides, and possibly even experimenting with glazes to see what effects I can get.

I think all the experimenting and trial and errors over the past year have only really touched on the tip of the iceberg where creating images, portraits, printing onto clay techniques are concerned and I still have a lot to improve and understand.  I have been learning techniques whilst also trying to work out how far you can push them or stray from the preferred way of doing a process.  This has at times made me want to choose the easy route.  I’m really glad I didn’t and that I have been pushed out of my comfort zone as I have stumbled across something that I really enjoy doing.

Would this be something I would offer a client? Yes I would.  I have had some really good feedback from friends with horses.  They like my work think it’s imaginative and unique.

And that is probably why I have struggled to find artists, ceramicists and sculptors to reference.     As I’ve said before, I still want to sculpt a horse.