Rupert Spira was born in London in 1960. He gained a degree at West Surrey College of Art and Design from 1978 – 80 under Henry Hammond and later trained with Michael Cardew at Wenford Bridge Pottery. In 1996 he set up his own studio at Church Farm, Shropshire.
The skill of throwing on a potter’s wheel is the basis of Rupert Spira’s work. Having been the apprentice to some major ceramic artists he sets very high standards in the craft of his art – making things larger and with extraordinary attention to detail than one might anticipate.
The versatility of his skills mean that works vary in scale from miniature to monumental and in decoration from monochrome to intricately hand-written texts. Rupert also painstakingly applies raised texts to some pieces, and in some cases poetry he has written himself.
![Rupert Spira Ceramics](https://www.joannabird.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/profile-1-copy-500x500.jpg)
Gallery - click images to enlarge
New Work
Chun glaze over embossed lettering
H 45 x D 49 cm
Embossed poem based off ‘Community Of The Spirit’ by Rumi:
Drink all your passion
and be a disgrace.
Close both eyes
to see with the other eye.
Open your hands
if you want to be held.
Close your mouth
to taste the lovers mouth in yours.
Flow down and down in always
widening rings of being.
Ref. RP-SOH-01
POA
New Work
Blue/grey glaze
H 15 – 18 x D 47 – 49 cm
Embossed poem based off Rumi’s work. While it does not match any specific poem from his collection, it encapsulates the spirit of Rumi’s mysticism, particularly his ideas about the soul’s union with the Beloved, the concept of annihilation in the divine presence, and the paradoxical beauty of emptiness and existence:
In the existence of your love I become non existent
this non existence I [l]in[k]ed to you is better than all existence
I saw you and became empty
this e[m]ptiness [,] more beautiful than existence [,] dissolves existence
and yet when I I comes existence thrives
Ref. RP-SOH-02
POA
New Work
Cream matt glaze with embossed lettering
H 9 x D 34 cm
Embossed poem based off ‘Every Time I Open My Eyes’ by Rupert Spira:
Every time I open my eyes I invite the world to take shape and every time the world takes shape I am invited to open my eyes
and see the world raw and naked holding out its hand calling me into itself where I am taken into the transparency of things and find myself transparent there
stand[ing on] the edge looking down and in to the dark silent pool in which the world is cradled and [I am] cradled the[re] held with all things and hold all things in myself
myself not a thing in the world but this here seeing here seeing in which the world opens inviting and offering itself
and every time [it is seen] it dies and in dying holds out is hand again asking to be taken in
and every time I take it in I to[o] die and in dying become this here seeing every time I open my eyes
I every time I open my eyes I invite the world to take shape and every ti[m]e the world takes shape I am invited to open my eyes and see the world raw and naken [naked].
Ref. RS-SOH-03
POA
Stoneware, layered white and manganese glazes with sgraffito linear design
Impressed RS seal
Circa 1995
Mug: H 12.4 x D 7.4 cm
Small Dish: H 2.3 x D 18.8 cm
Large Dish: H 3.2 x D 27.2 cm
Ref. RS23
£3,500 + ARR
10 settings, 4 pieces per setting
commission, unsigned
Bowl H 6.8 x D 17 cm
Small plate D 19.6 cm
Medium plate D 23 cm
Large Plate D 27.5 cm
Ref. RS24
Stoneware, vivid copper red glaze
H 9.8 x D 27.4 cm
Impressed with the artist’s seal
c. 2002
Ref. RS256
£3,200 + ARR
Stoneware, vivid yellow glaze
Approx. H 5.8 x D 9.1 cm
Impressed with artist’s seal
c. 2003
Ref. RS257
£3,500 + ARR
Stoneware, turquoise jun glaze
c. 1997
Left: H 19 x D 17 cm (Ref. RS255)
Right: H 14 x D 15 cm (ref. RS253)
Ref. RS255; RS253
£3,200 + ARR | £2,400 + ARR
Sold
Stoneware, pale blue jun crackle glaze with a deep pink blush to the underside of the cups. Saucers have shallow fluting across the surface and iron speckles. Impressed RS seals.
H 7 x D 18 cm, H 8 x D 18.5 cm
Ref. RS247a-b
Sold
1996
Stoneware, turquoise blue glaze, softly running to reveal a pale green rim, impressed RS seal
H 11 x D 29 cm
Ref. RS248
Sold
Stoneware
Cup: H 7 x D 11 cm
Saucer: H 3 x D 18.5 cm
Sold as a pair
Ref. RS246a-b
![](https://www.joannabird.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/20210204_jb_187-2-560x560.jpg)
Pair of Turquiose, Indigo Glaze Beakers >
Sold
Stoneware
Circa 1980s, studio of Rupert Spira
H 13 cm
Ref. RS18
Stoneware
D 28.5 cm
Impressed with RS seal
Circa 1994
(2 available)
Ref. RS12
£850
Sold
Small yellow, chun and red glazed bowls
Stoneware, impressed RS mark
Circa 2008
Ref. RS14 / RS15 / RS16