Ceramic pieces in beautiful shapes are commonplace, even the ones decorated with flowers and designs. But here’s a ceramicist who displays exceptional skills to mold such unique patterns with shards of clay that you can only marvel at her magic.
This master ceramicist is the London and Barcelona-based Olivia Walker, whose intricate work on ceramic pottery is making waves on the internet. She’s a trained ceramicist having received ceramics training at the University of Creative Arts in Farnham, UK. After this, she went on to train under the renowned potter Julian Stair.
Walker’s initial step is to create the basic shape of her ceramic piece on a potter’s wheel and then adorn it with thousands of paper-like fragments of clay that appear as organic growths. Speaking to Colossal, she explains, “I start from a set point on a bowl and let these organic accretions spread out and grow – eating through, or growing over the form beneath. These make reference to organisms – fungus, coral and bacteria – but are unidentifiable.”
Walker favorite medium is clay because this natural material can be recycled endlessly till it’s fired in the kiln and it doesn’t produce any waste products too. She uses clay with the consistency of leather and loves to watch it change color as it dries. She then fires her pieces just once, unlike twice, which is the norm. She uses minimum clay in her creations.
The characteristics of materials allow her to create unique textures and finishes. In an interview to materialsoul.com, she says, “Each piece I make is unique. I spend many days building up the texture that I apply to the surface of a piece. This texture is made up from individually made and applied shards of clay, and therefore the final piece can’t be replicated.”
Walker displayed her works in the New Member Showcase at CAA Gallery in London in 2018. Her works were also displayed at the British Craft Pavilion as a part of the London Design Festival. Her one-of-a-kind creations are keenly followed on her Instagram page. Presently, she works from her Devon studio.
Olivia Walker: Website | Instagram | Twitter
