Something out of Nothing

The ceramic assemblages in this catalogue were made within a year, but they draw on a collection of ceramics gathered together over three decades – things bought, found, commissioned and given. The twenty-five piece series encompasses 18th-century shipwrecked porcelain, Sardinian, Spanish and Turkish tiles, Dresden figurines, Chinese votive offerings, Armitage Shanks sanitary ware, Minton and Spode, a 2000-year-old Han Dynasty horse’s head and present day seaside knick-knacks.

These pieces play on specific cultural associations  the ‘resonance  of the far-flung objects from which they have been made. As a group they call into question what we consider authentic and regard as kitsch; they also invite us to re-evaluate some of the assumptions which – taken for granted – collectively constitute taste. The accompanying essays amplify the thinking behind each of the assemblages, and the catalogue also includes ten poems written in response to ceramics, six of which have appeared in collections published over the last fifteen years. Gathered together here for the first time these poems, assemblages and essays investigate how we look at ceramic, and ask how seriously we should take them.

Gregory Warren Wilson is a glass artist and poet. He has published six collections of poetry, and a book of fables. His visual art is represented by the Joanna Bird Gallery.