Art – Anna Kime

A new home

After a hiatus in my practice for various reasons I am delighted to announce I have moved into a new studio. I’m very lucky to be joining a group of wonderful artists who call Exchange Place their home.

Yorkshire Artspace have welcomed me so warmly and I’m thrilled to be part of their community again. It is my first solo studio space which is exciting and a little imposter syndrome making. My new peers have been sending encouraging messages and offers of chats and coffee, this really helps it feel like the right move.

An open doorway with a view to a fairly empty room with wall cupboards and some mono prints visible. — Making myself at home – a new studio, G.O4A at Exchange Place

Visit my Yorkshire Artspace page

Growing a thicker skin

I’m developing a body of work called Carapace, they’re going to be armours, skins, husks… wearable hopefully. For this I’m experimenting with paper clay, how thin can I make it, what qualities can I make the most of. I’m also re-organising this site to ensure images of my work are more prominent.

Scion Cupola Contemporary Gallery Christmas Show on NOW

I have a new piece of work called Nidus in Cupola’s Christmas Show, featured on their instagram site here

New Work: Crustaceous Collection

I unloaded my kiln this morning and then cracked open a couple of saggar pots that had been fired with wood ash, banana skins and all manner of organic matter. I’d also been anticipating some plinth like slabs to seat my smaller sculptures. The pieces came together in such a pleasing satisfying way. I can always tell when I’’m really happy with work because I photograph it endlessly. I’ve tried to edit a couple of sets as follows.

Stoneware pot with porcelain pieces inside — Saggar from Crustaceous collection

Empty stoneware pot with firing residue — Saggar from Crustaceous collection

I wrote about feeling crustaceous here. The idea of forming a crust, skin or protective shell is very familiar territory for my work. With these I love how briny they look.

Porcelain pieces on rusted looking plinth like slabs — Crustaceous collection

Several porcelain pieces on rusted looking plinth like slabs — Crustaceous collection

A porcelain piece on a rusted looking plinth like slab — Crustaceous collection

Crustaceous…

I love the idea of having a hardened exterior. I definitely don’t permanently but it is a good feeling to be finding your shell again. This word also relates to new work on which a longer piece will follow. I did the sketch below after loading but before unloading my kiln and I was so pleased to see the same shapes emerging.

of, relating to, having, or forming a crust or shell
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/crustaceous

Several porcelain pieces — Crustaceous sketch

Emotion of the day series, with thanks to Be Manzini

The Furies research

Enjoying researching fury related words for my four protest badges. The words in the photo are taken from the etymology of forge, fray, fiery and fight.

Work in progress: Protest badges

Having fired the moulds taken from the plaster ceiling rose (see previous Instagram posts here and here) I pressed the first round of porcelain shapes today. The hands holding tools are the most interesting to me and I’ve started to think of these as protest badges. I’m thinking of calling the collection The Furies and then individually they could be things like Fiery, Fury, Frustration, Forge, Fight. The potentially unglazed porcelain or a matte finish glaze will hopefully evoke a classical marble statue. I’m hoping to finish these for Sheffield Ceramics Festival in July.

Photo of porcelain work in progress — The Furies protest badges in progress

Honoured…

I felt very honoured to be featured by Aesthetica recently in a piece about sculpture evolving. Lacuna was longlisted for Aesthetica’s Art Prize in 2015. I remember being asked to write something for the Art Prize Future Now Anthology. It was one if the first times I took a deep breath and wrote what I thought and felt:

“I am preoccupied by the alchemical, the haptic and the woeful disregard for the conjury of ceramics, the illegitimate art form. My work represents states of being, relies on recognition – of the everyday, of human stance and domestic scale – often taking etymological origins.
Lacuna – an unfilled space, a gap, an extended silence or depression – is a once-thrown piece that rests and melts with hidden pools, smooth folds and broken loops.”
Lacuna, Future Now Anthology 2015

Screenshot of Aesthetica website — Anna featured in Aesthetica article

Emotion of the day series, with thanks to Be Manzini

Work in progress: Totem

A good studio session throwing porcelain for a new tall (taller than kiln) sculpture to be stacked over a cane for support.

A close up image of thrown porcelain cylinders — Detail of throwing work in progress (Totem)

A close up of a charcoal sketch for Totem of stacked shapes — Detail of throwing work in progress (Totem)

Returning to my studio

On Monday I spent the day in my studio for the first time in months. Winter and lockdown had combined to make it very difficult to be there. It was an apt moment to take visual stock of my surroundings, how comfortable they still felt and how excited I was to be back.