text: Nancy Frost - made in the marchesgallery​
  As a material, clay has a life of its own. It is wet, juicy, malleable. If you approach it with respect it will do almost anything you ask of it. When fired it acquires durability and a kind of permanence. A successful form, though transformed into something fixed and hard, retains a vigour and a freshness which bring it to life. Striving to achieve this is a journey that only gets more exciting.
  I produce functional ware as well as work that is more expressive in nature. Making pottery that people choose to bring into their daily lives is deeply satisfying. I believe that using an individually crafted dish at the dinner table can transform a meal from the everyday to the particular.
  My sculptural work incorporates found objects – often driftwood – with individually modelled ceramic birds and nest forms. As one living far from the place of my birth, I find potent symbolism in the way birds make their homes from the materials they find in their environment.
  The 'Land Into Art' exhibition inspired me to begin to work with the finds I have collected from years of gardening and digging in the soil.
  Pottery shards, clay pipe stems, random bits of metal, and old toys have emerged from garden beds. Often, the years spent in the soil have affected a transformation of some sort, through wear, weather, breakage, or rust. These changes might suggest a purpose different than was originally intended.
  The toys included in the piece Child's Play surfaced over a number of years. I was shocked when I realised one day that nearly every item in my 'toy box' was a soldier, or a superhero, or a weapon.
  Each recovery has a story to tell, and whether I can hear that story clearly, or only begin to imagine it, their histories call to me.
  I work out of a back garden studio near Kington, which is open to visitors by appointment. I also organise and exhibit in a monthly Art and Craft Market in Kington, held on the third Saturday of every month from April to December.