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John fell in love with clay while studying
at Bryn Athyn College near Philadelphia. One
semester at Tyler Art School nearby, cemented
this passion when it coincided with Ensica Annual
clay bash, which was hosted in Philadelphia
that year. “Its not that I learnt all
that much about clay at college, but rather
that I got to hang out with people who could
create pure |
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magic from a lump of clay with
very little other than an unusually well developed
sense of exploration and experimentation”. |
So from helping Rolf Roelofson build one of his “statement
kilns” to wedging every conceivable oxide into
clay and salt firing it to Raku firing things that
were too big too move cold, never mind at 1000 degrees
c, to stuffing a TV into a wood kiln at 1400 degrees
C late late one night, to hanging out with some eastern
European potters who had been brought to America from
behind the Iron curtain for the first time thanks
to Glasnost and the American endowment of the arts.
John had to return to Cape Town to try and make a
living out of clay.
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John Raku fired in Muizenburg for four years and sold to galleries and at craft
markets. In 1995 Louise Whitelaw, Johns best
friend and lover of six years agreed to marry
him on condition that she could give up being
an air hostess. John and Louise got married,
got a loan, got a jigger, a 40 ft kiln and some
staff to help. Soon they were supplying Cape
Town with good looking well priced crockery
through all the craft markets. Soon after a
move to Bot River where they rented premises
on the Beaumont wine farm, John started |
reduction firing. “at first
I could not give it away” says John “but
now its my signature range. |
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Louise and John made
a real success out of there crockery business and
were able to build their dream home, studio and shop
in Bettys Bay with the proceeds, that took 3 years.
Around that time 3 things happened pretty much simultaneously,
Louise got pregnant (very bad for trading at craft
markets every sat and Sunday) John got really sick
of mass producing crockery (really bad for supplying
tons of it too craft markets every sat and Sunday)
and thirdly Trevor Manuel opened the flood gates of
cheap Chinese imports (really bad for sales)
John and Louise were one of the few small dinnerware
operations still standing after the Mr Price home
store scourge had run its course. The paradigm shift
from craft market crockery to art gallery ceramics
has led John and Louise to venture back into Raku
and Saggar firing as well as expand on the palette
of reduction glazes for which John is becoming increasingly
well known.
Louise, John and their son Gabriel live above the
pottery studio/gallery with their bull terrier Betty
and white rat Garnet in Bettys Bay.
The gallery is on Clarence
Drive and is open
seven days a week from 9:30 to 5 pm
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