Vase

The wheel-thrown ceramics of Claudia Lis demonstrate the harmony of discord. Her strong and focused forms with meditative surfaces are a marriage of opposites. Here a blotted-ink mark punctuates the perfection of grey-green celadon glaze. This mark together with minuscule surface blemishes are made from embedded rust flakes, which melt and expand outwards during the firing process, leaving an abstract impression. Lis initially observed this effect unintentionally when rust from her kiln fused to ceramics during firing. [1]

The gently curved form is also interrupted with angular spike-like lugs. Lis often exhibits her work in groups, these still-life tableaus heighten the subtleties of form, colour and surface detail which are intrinsic to her work.

She undertook a three-year pottery apprenticeship in Germany before coming to England 1997, where she undertook a placement in the studio of ceramicist Rupert Spira. Lis remained working with Spira until 2014 when she established her own studio in Montgomery, Wales.

Sim Panaser, July 2020

[1] Philip Hughes, ‘Eye and Hand’, Ceramic Review, 242 (March/April 2010), 39-41 (p. 41).