Studio 6

Ian Marsh

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A series of craft work in focus from Welsh ceramic makers

Series curation: Wendy Lawrence
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I taught Maths in Liverpool and Yorkshire for 30 years and was Head of Information Technology. After taking early retirement I took up pottery and have been making for the past 25 years.

On leaving teaching I worked alongside and was mentored by Ceramicist Jim Robison and co-authored the A&C Ceramics Handbook “Slab Techniques”.

For five years I edited the Northern Potters Newsletter and was Chair for eighteen months before moving to Wales fourteen years ago. As a North Wales Potters member I represented them as a director of the International Ceramics Festival in 2019 and prior to that I was official photographer at two events in 2015 and 2017.

Currently I am a member of the Potters’ Gallery in Conwy and of Celf Aran artists in Dolgellau. In the past I have exhibited in Potfests, Ceramic Art Wales, Ceramic Art York and Portmeirion Food and Craft.

I live a beautiful part of North Wales and am influenced by the rich natural and industrial environment. The array of colours of the rocks, slate and flora is magical and an endless source of inspiration.

I love handbuilding and in particular extruding clay, altering regular shapes, squares, circles, hexagons etc from their perfect lines by stretching, tearing, marking and adding clay to see where it takes me! But also using other irregular dies to build up sculptural pieces, exploring the form with the spaces they generate. One aspect in particular fascinates me: by excluding the air from inside the cylinder there is an organic movement of the soft clay during firing. This will often dictate the final form of the piece.

Glazing is another area full of possibilities. Currently I am looking at iron glazes producing rich black surfaces.

Looking forward to more exciting adventures.