Craig Underhill
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Beyond the Wall, 2014.
Ceramic with engloves, glaze, underglaze and oxides - fired to 1140°C.
Photo credit: Craig Underhill. -
Tidal Flow, 2015.
Ceramic with englobes, glaze, underglaze and oxides - fired to 1140°C.
Photo credit: Craig Underhill. -
Beach Horizon, 2014.
Ceramic with englobes, glaze, underglaze and oxides - fired to 1140°C.
Photo credit: Craig Underhill. -
Blue Horizon, 2015.
Ceramic with englobes, glaze, underglaze and oxides - fired to 1140°C.
Photo credit: Craig Underhill.
What inspires me
The seemingly endless possibilities of using ceramic materials to produce a rich vocabulary of surface mark making, texture and colour inspires me. Places, landscapes and the changing seasons also inspire my work.
I make slab built ceramics (normally vessel forms) that I use like a canvas to which I apply a variety of marks. I want my work to suggest ideas and feeling about places and landscapes without giving literal references.
Making in the Midlands
Place has always been a primary concern in my work from my student days to now. Therefore exploring, experiencing and looking at my environment is an important aspect of my working practice. Both the urban and rural environment of the Midlands has been very influential.
A region can give contemporary craft an identity and contemporary craft can give a region an identity. Recognition at a more local level is important to me because this is where I make my work and the place where I make influences my work.
What has changed most about the crafts in the last thirty years
The technical standard of work being made is much higher. I think contemporary craft has been influenced by ideas from the arts more generally and this has made the work being produced in craft more imaginative. The decline in the importance of craft in education has been very noticeable and is a big concern. The importance of making and understanding materials is a fundamental human need; I like to believe that in this rapidly changing digital age people are beginning to recognise that making, exploring and expressing ideas in a hands-on way is as important as ever.
Website: http://www.craigunderhill.com
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