Innovations in Ceramic Art 2018

The third annual Innovations in Ceramic Art will be taking place on Saturday 3 and Sunday 4 March in Cambridge Guildhall. Over 55 artists from across the UK, France and the Netherlands will be coming to Cambridge to show their creations at the first major ceramic fair of 2018. The public will have the opportunity to view the work of some of the most talented ceramicists working today and chat with them about their work.

This year for the first time we have set-aside the majority of the Small Guildhall for four artists; Marion Stuart, Jo Gifford, Sarah Villeneau and Wendy Campbell-Briggs to use their creativity to produce insulations specifically for Innovations in Ceramic Art.

Wendy Campbell-Briggs and Sarah Villeneau present the ‘Cabinet of Curiosities’ of the late Lady Rose Smithfield-Penn – ‘Exploration of the Carpathian Mountains, 1841’, a collection of cultural artifacts and curious organic specimens of historic and scientific interest. These objects are evocative of memories and emotions; both created and eroded by the elements. They beg the question: what are they and where did they come from?

Jo Gifford’s practice is a process led, material based exploration of the boundaries that separate self from other and the ordering systems superimposed on our conscious and unconscious thinking. Her underlying interest is in how we group and categorise to help us understand the world around and within us. Playing with the fragility of enforced containment and avoiding predetermined outcomes, her pieces are curiously unfamiliar, open to interpretation.

Marion Stuart’s installation is part of an ongoing examination of carpentry tools inherited from her father. At the age of fifteen he was apprenticed to a ship building company and as he was the son of an impoverished widow, his tools were bought by a local charity, the tools changed the direction of his life. In this narrative she communicates the story of the tools and also a story of the men of this time.