Made From the Earth, Inspired by Earth and Beyond
Michelle has been making pots for over 35 years. Her small workshop is based in Oby in rural Norfolk, where she makes hand thrown stoneware pots for use in the home & individual raku fired vessels.
The pots in her stoneware range are individually wheel thrown. Each piece is impressed with stamps, cogs, buttons & roulette wheels which form pattern on their surface. They are then glazed with her own glazes to enhance their textural surfaces and fired to stoneware temperatures making them durable, functional pieces designed for everyday use & can be put in the dishwasher if required.
Her raku work consists of a range of both ‘naked’ and glazed raku vessels and is inspired by photographic images of planet earth as seen from the International Space Station and also recent images of Jupiter from NASA’s Juno cam. Forms are wheel thrown, then decorated with terra sigillata slips. Layers of decoration are used to illustrate surfaces in a 2-dimensional way as would be seen from outer space. Some pieces are then burnished, some glazed.
Raku fired wares are usually still porous after firing, but some of her small vases & bottle shapes have been sealed to make them water-tight for flowers. One of her ‘earth’ pots has been bought by a customer working for the European Space Agency in the Netherlands. She also had the opportunity to meet ESA Astronaut Tim Peake and was able to gift to him a piece of her work that was inspired by his amazing photography from the International Space Station.
