Slab pot

This early slab-built pot by Ian Auld is richly textured with a heavily grogged brown slip. A circular shape is impressed centrally on both sides, using a plaster of Paris seal. Auld often used this technique to mark the surfaces of his forms. Auld was a collector of African objects and the shapes of his seals were influenced by the geometric designs of Akan gold weights used in Ghana between 1400 and 1900. [1]

Auld studied ceramics under William Newland at the Institute of Education in 1951 and became a technician at the Central School of Arts and Crafts in early 1950s. Auld was one of a group of hand builders connected to the Central School, who explored experimental approaches to clay and aligned their practice closer to fine art and sculpture than studio pottery. Others included Gordon Baldwin, Ruth Duckworth and Dan Arbeid.

In 1954 Auld was asked to establish a pottery department at an art school in Baghdad and he stayed in the Middle East until 1957. In the early 1970s a further teaching position in Nigeria greatly influenced his later works. In 1974 he was made Head of Ceramics at Camberwell, where he taught students including Sara Radstone and Julian Stair.

Sim Panaser, September 2020

[1] Sue Harley, ‘Ian Auld and Gillian Lowndes’, Ceramic Review, 44 (March/April 1977), 3-6, (p. 4).