Food is my language of love. It is the blood that runs in my veins.
The desire to create has always been strong. Making pottery brings together my passion for food and a strong sense of aesthetics and ceremony.
When I was growing up my mother began teaching the women in our neighbourhood ceramics. She was facing a very difficult time in her life and even as a young girl I could see that pottery was a place for her to go. A place of solace. When my mother was totally absorbed in her pottery studio, I was in the kitchen making food. Although I was surrounded by ceramics as a child I wasn’t very interested in it. I did have a go on several occasions, making little pinch pots and building coil pots, even learning how to throw on the wheel, but it didn’t grab me like cooking did. Cooking became my life and I had a good career as a chef, for many years until, and even after my university studies in art, where I majored in drawing.
When my mother died in 2019, I moved to Cairns where I met an incredible bunch of women at TAFE ceramics class. I couldn’t help but think that my mother was channeling me to get her hands in the clay, or at least steering me to a safe supportive place. My pottery practice is centred around the humble pinch pot. I love the directness of this process where it’s just me and the clay. With hands in the earth, I allow myself to become lost in process.
A conversation takes place between the clay and my hands and I try to allow this process to be fluid and to give voice to the very nature of the clay. This usually results in a rather organic form which I like to think reflects nature.
I love the way ceramics enhances the enjoyment of food. It can take a simple meal to new heights, an every day meal can become a special ceremony and a special meal becoming a work of art. I also love working in sets, or what I fondly name, clusters. Like little families, the pots in these clusters exist as individuals but are enhanced and supported by the others in the group. Ceramics is not unlike the process of cooking, and they can both take me on a mystical journey. By slowly pinching a pot into shape and listening to the clay, I can become lost in the present moment, the clay, and the rhythmical pinching process, which together transforms the ball of clay into it’s new shape. What’s not to love about that! web kathall.com.au and even apply custom CSS to this text in the module Advanced settings.
