Major Changes have taken place in our lives.
It has now been almost a year since we moved to Edmonton on very short notice. As the saying goes we were made an offer we couldn’t refuse and took the opportunity to move to Edmonton to be closer to family. Leaving friends and our land was heart breaking but the isolation of Covid and opportunity to be near family won out.
We left the kiln in the the good hands of our dear friends and have found new opportunities here. I was able to join the Edmonton Potters Guild in January and have finally returned to the studio. I have already started making for a repeat of the empty bowl project and this year promises to be bigger that last. Stay tuned.
Our old life
It was only after retiring from teaching Art History that I returned to the studio to make pots. I began my career as a visual art studio major at University many years ago after a brief flirt with professional photography. Completing a degree in Education I returned to Queen’s University with family in tow to do a Masters degree in Canadian Art History and eventually spent several decades teaching at Grande Prairie Regional College.
Jeannette helping fire Bibi’s Anagama
At the time of my retirement my wife Jeannette and I were fortunate to develop a friendship with Bibi Clement who introduced us to her laborious process of firing her Anagama kiln. The magic and alchemy of earth, fire and air led us to build our own cross draft, gas fired kiln. The kiln room is a repurposed grain bin that was formally owned by artist Euphemia McNaught. To achieve the beautiful wood fired and salt effects seen in Bibi’s work requires a large Anagama kiln and was a daunting prospect. A gas reduction kiln was within reach however and while the effects are not as dramatic, it shares some of the beauty and mystery of the flame and atmospheric firing. We make all of our own glazes like those of the British and Japanese tradition and are made primarily from natural ash reclaimed from the fireplace and slips made from locally dug clay.
McNaught Granary
Reduction firing our kiln
As an Art Historian, I was fascinated with traditional forms in pottery – Classical Greek, Medieval French, the British Arts and Crafts movement of the 19th Century and in particular the Studio Pottery renaissance led by Bernard Leach and Shoji Hamada in England in the 20th Century. Both Hamada and Leach were steeped in the traditional crafts of Korea and Japan and initiated an East/West exchange of ideas which has shaped much of artistic pottery of the world today. This interest in the East/West influences is shared with Bibi. From her home and studio in the Peace River country she has become one of the leading exponents of the Japanese ceramic tradition in Western Canada.