Arts 27 August 2024

Callendar House: New exhibitions celebrate Falkirk’s ceramic heritage and contemporary talent

Two new exhibitions are offering a look into the area’s rich pottery history and the contemporary ceramics scene in Scotland. "Dunmore: A Conversation in Pottery" and "FLUX” open this Saturday (24 August) and local people and art enthusiasts are invited to explore the legacy of Dunmore Pottery and the innovative work of modern Scottish ceramicists.

Dunmore   A conversation in Pottery featuring artist Steph Liddle

24 Aug – 16 March 2025

2nd floor galleries

In this exhibition we want to celebrate Dunmore Pottery. Often viewed as art pottery, in reality it had a foot in both the industrial and the art pottery worlds.  Situated in Airth this fascinating pottery merged the need for mass production, to be financially viable, with the ability to produce ‘on trend’ pieces and highlight the artistic genius of its owner. As well as being business savvy Peter Gardner, the owner of the pottery, was also a technically astute potter with an ability to produce glazes and colours that still amaze us today.

To help us understand and appreciate Gardner’s work we have commissioned artist Steph Liddle to respond to the collection and make her own work as an exploration of form and glazes inspired by Dunmore.

The exhibition will feature works by Dunmore Pottery alongside pieces made by Steph as a response to the museum collection.

FLUX 

 24 August – 27 October 2024

Park Gallery

Flux is a ceramics exhibition featuring the work of seven amazing contemporary ceramics and pottery artists :

• ·       Kirstie J Anderson
• ·       Susie Dalton
• ·       Steph Liddle
• ·       Viv Lee
• ·       Cath Pots
• ·       Natalie Wood
• ·       Celia Wood

Their work reflects the ceramics scene in Scotland which is a wide ranging and varied field, both in character and use of materials.

Textile artist turned ceramicist Kirsty Jay Anderson makes functional stoneware ceramics using minimal contemporary shapes with a rustic warm feeling you find at home. The ceramic pieces range from mugs and bowls for daily use as well as unique vases and bowls. Her ceramics are inspired by nature and the path it leaves behind in the landscape. The vessels themselves are simple shapes taken from Kirsty’s interest in the aesthetics of past objects such as milk churns, chemistry beakers and enamel wear. These shapes will continue to inform each other as she grows and develops her practice

Each vessel is hand thrown on a wheel, made with a mix of two stone wear clay with iron speckle, glazed in satin with black iron oxide.

Susie Rose Dalton a visual artist from Northern Ireland.  Her work explores human transience and the records we make in our environments. Her artistic practice is heavily informed by her academic background in archaeology. She is inspired by archaeology’s ability to celebrate the mundane alongside the monumental- in her work she pays particular attention to the overlooked and the personal.

In 2021 she received an award from Wasps, the UK’s largest artist space provider, and an Emerging Artist grant from Edinburgh City Council. She has exhibited in a number of solo and group exhibitions, including the Summer Exhibition in the Royal Academy of Art and Architecture in London in 2022.

In 2021 she was also named one of 30 Under 30 Inspiring Young Women in Scotland by the Young Women’s Movement in Scotland. She has been shortlisted for several other awards, most notably receiving a ‘Very Special Mention’ in Miranda July’s Online International Covid Arts Festival in 2020.

She holds an MA (Hons) in Archaeology from the University of Edinburgh and an MFA in Fine Art from Duncan of  Jordanstone College of Art and Design in Dundee.

Steph Liddle is a Ceramic Designer/Maker who makes playful and thoughtful handmade ceramics. With an eye for colour and pattern, She draws on her background in Illustration to create contemporary, graphic ceramic homewares.

Her work is known for being playful yet refined. Minimal in shape, yet boldly patterned. It embraces and embodies contrast through varying textures, finishes, and colour palettes to create functional ceramics that delight the senses - necklaces that get warm as you wear them; cups that leave you wanting to hold them long after your drink has gone; and pots whose texture changes as you run your hand across them.

Each piece is made by hand - first the forms are slip cast in either white stoneware or Parian porcelain using bespoke moulds, then the patterns are individually painted on by hand. Every piece is imperfectly unique, with subtle differences worth celebrating.

Viv Lee grew up in the bustling metropolis of Hong Kong. Some of her fondest childhood memories involved time spent in nature, these experiences created a vision of nature that appeared to be playful, alive, and a way of being that felt integrally connected to the natural world. She graduated from art school in 2017 and began working full-time as an artist-maker in 2018. Living in Scotland with ready access to the wild landscape has been instrumental in reawakening her relationship to nature.

Inspired by memories and artefacts of ancient cultures, her practice has been concerned with creating objects from clay as a means of exploring themes of identity, belonging, hybridity and interconnection with the natural world. Working with stoneware and terracotta, she creates one-off and limited-edition hand-built functional sculptures, such as vessels, lamps, small tables, and decorative objects. Whenever possible, she gathers materials from the local environment, such as wild clay for incorporating into clay bodies and slips, stones for mark-making, and shells for developing glazes.

Making her practice as sustainable and environmentally friendly as possible has been an increasingly important consideration. Whenever local materials are foraged, she takes care to ensure there is minimal disturbance to the environment and wildlife. Her desire is to move towards sourcing and collecting as much of her materials as possible from Scotland.  

Recent work from the Ornis series featured in this exhibition explores bird symbology, which has been associated with the energy of the Goddess in both ancient mythologies of the East and the West. Pieces are either finished with the application of oxides, wild clay slips and underglazes, or left unglazed to show the body of the clay and have been fired in either oxidation or reduction atmospheres.

Cath Pots, Catherine Maskell (artist real name) is a self-taught ceramicist and educator. Beginning her work with clay during night classes at a community arts centre in 2016, she has undertaken several short courses to further develop her skills and understanding of clay and craft. Catherine began selling functional work online and at several markets nationwide in 2018, which led to further commissions for functional dinnerware for several restaurants, including the Michelin starred Kol, in London. Inspired by the natural world and the studio pottery tradition, she currently fires her ceramic pieces both in oxidation (electric kiln) as well as in atmospheric firings (wood and gas kilns). In the past year she has been awarded Creative Scotland funding and exhibited her more conceptual work in group shows, including the VAS Centenary exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in Edinburgh.

Natalie J Woods is a ceramic designer and maker whose minimalist pieces in slip cast Parian are produced using plaster molds she makes herself in her Edinburgh studio. Focusing on clean lines and unique colours, Wood describes her work as “minimal homeware.” Her range of water carafes, cups, low pourers and plates is titled ‘Detsu’. The meaning came from Wood’s two aesthetic inspirations – ’De' from the Dutch word for 'the', and 'tsu' from the Japanese 'genjitsu' meaning reality or actuality. Wood’s simple, elegant forms are impeccably restrained, decorative and functional.

Celia Wood is a ceramicist based in Edinburgh. Her work explores the idea of ceramic narrative in conjunction with functionality. Her work is made using hand building techniques that provide fun and quirky canvases for colourful illustrations. Everyday observations, folk art and nature are common themes in her illustrations. She aims to provide joy and fun through the work she makes!