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The patina comes later and is for me the most enjoyable part of the making process. The scraping down and burnishing of the clay, pushing back the grog, or the reverse, the fluffing up of the surface texture leaving it open, rough and raw.
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Ceramic sculptor
Since the opening of ‘Ozora Studios’ Margate in 2018, ceramic sculptor, Abigail Ozora Simpson, has taken her work to another level. Abigail hand coils large sculptures using coarse black and pink stoneware clays that are fired to a high temperature. Some of these pieces are monumental in size and every piece is unique.
BEYOND THE FAMILIAR
The form has always been paramount in her work and her aim is to create objects that transcend any immediate recognition of the process and even the material. It has been a slow journey over time. From vessels to sculpture, decoration to surface and function to non-function, along with the scale and the inevitable risk.
Pure sculpture
She is interested in the raw visceral properties of the clay and also in juxtaposition: groups of objects, their relationships, either coherent or non-coherent and how the ancient history of ceramics can touch the possibility of pure sculpture.
Pushing the boundaries
In 2019, she took part in ‘Artists Rooms’ with Richeldis Fine Art and Encounter Contemporary, for which she created an installation piece consisting of 17 pieces of work. Since then her work has developed and gained a confidence and maturity, which has led to her pushing the boundaries of the materials. Both the clay and the vessel have been taken to a point where any semblance of studio pottery has been left behind.
Creative collaborations
Working with Ralph Pucci International (co-hosted by Architectural Digest USA), the artist collaborated with cellist Rubin Kodheli, who has performed with genre defining artists such as Laurie Anderson and Philip Glass, to create a unique performance within a sculptural setting. He stated "I enjoyed performing in the presence of her art immensely".
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I choose to work with an extremely dense coarse black clay. (In fact it is red in colour before it is fired.) and a pale clay that when fired to a certain temperature has the beautiful colour of pale pink rendered plaster. These clays are strong and contain grog (ground up pieces of fired clay to give it extra strength.) Because of the nature of the shapes that I make I need to trust in my materials in its rawest state. It is a long process and the preparation and execution at the initial stages are as crucial as the development of shape and surface texture.
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