In the PROFILES section: 7 ceramic artists from Lithuania, Japan / USA, Germany, USA, France, USA. Coverage of EXHIBITIONS and EVENTS in Germany, Italy, France, Slovenia, Denmark, UK, Morocco, USA. In the section ARTIST JOURNAL, we present Kuniko Kinoto and Melis Buyruk And we also have interviews with artists IN STUDIO as well as listings of Dates, Courses, Seminars and Markets.
NEWS
PROFILES
Agne Šemberaite – Lithuania
Douglas Black – Japan / USA
Gisela Hahn – Germany
Meggi Rochell – Germany
Peter Olson – USA
Nàto Bosc-Ducros – France
Marc Leuthold – USA
EXHIBITIONS / EVENTS
Dorothee Wenz – Oldenburg – Germany
Ceramics Market – Dießen – Germany
La Meridiana – Bagnano – Italy
30 Years: Staufen Museum Support Group – Germany
Pekka Paikkari – Enserune – France
“Fake Food” – Hohenberg a.d. Eger – Germany
Ceramics Fair – Oldenburg – Germany
Dragica Cadež – Ljubljana – Slovenia
Bente Skjøttgaard – Middelfart – Denmark
“Distinctly Here” – Siegburg – Germany
Ceramic Art London – UK
Earth Architecture in Morocco – Ceramics & Travel
Jody Folwell – Charlotteville – USA
BOOKS
New literature
ARTIST JOURNAL
Kuniko Kinoto (Japan) and Melis Buyruk (Turkey) – Ting-Ju Shao
IN STUDIO
Andy Rogers – Evelyne Schoenmann– Interview / Developing Skills
DATES / Exhibitions / Galleries / Museums
COURSES / SEMINARS / MARKETS
ADVERTISEMENTS
PREVIEW
Agne Šemberaite is one of the most distinctive contemporary Lithuanian ceramists. She organises solo exhibitions, participates in group and competition-based exhibitions, and also curates them. Agne’s work is impossible to overlook thanks to her unique creative approach and originality. She made a striking entry into the art scene just over two decades ago, following her ceramics studies at Vilnius Academy of Arts. This was a time of political upheaval, when the established framework of artistic life in Lithuania was shifting, as the older generation stepped aside to make way for younger artists, eager to carve out their own path in the art world.
Over the past two decades, Šemberaite’s creative journey has been remarkably consistent, marked by no significant shifts or changes in style. Her early works already transported viewers to the realm of fantasy. From the outset, she was drawn to the plasticity of figures, emerging as a storyteller who reimagines the narratives of fairy tales and dreams.
For quite some time, Agne showcased works from her series Once Upon a Time There Lived a Girl (2009-2015), which explored the tales of Little Red Riding Hood and an orphan girl lost in the woods.
(Lijana Nataleviciene)
Agne Šemberaite
Sometimes it happens: You reach into a treasure chest without knowing it‘s a treasure chest and you find a diamond.
That’s certainly what happened to Gisela Hahn when she launched on preparing a new series of works. In a world that constantly dreams of modernity and progress, that never stops chattering about the future, that is proud of its technological achievements, and in which one latest trend breathlessly follows the next, the ceramic artist found inspiration in the distant past, namely the Bronze Age.
Her series of works, FUNDSTÜCKE (“Found Objects”), draws parallels between vessels from this era and ceramic forms of expression that can be classified as independent of the spirit of the times.
Her fascination began in the museum of the Slavic fortress Raddusch, located in Lower Lusatia, Brandenburg. There, she came across a group of Bronze Age vessel ceramics from the Lower Lusatian culture, which, due to the context of where they were found, are considered to be funerary pottery. Her fascination with these early ceramics, distinguished by their clear formal idiom and timeless beauty, inspired her to create a masterpiece.
Conscious of the technical skill of her ancestors and the artistic vision inherent in her understanding of history, she studied the prehistoric vessels, not only honouring the ceramic craftsmanship of the Bronze Age but also drawing a broad arc to contemporary vessel art.
(Annette Ody)
Gisela Hahn
A girl on roller skates, a man lying in a boat, two children balanced on XXL building blocks, a female torso with a bird just sitting on its outstretched hand, its wings flapping as it takes off – one could cite many other situations that Meggi Rochell captures, which she creates to depict people in motion, in various positions and moments in time. They all have their starting point in personal themes with which Rochell endeavours to capture and reflect human emotions. They are everyday situations as well as those born from the imagination, which also seem unrealistic because the artist always depicts her human figures naked – with the exception of her depictions of children. For this, she uses clay, one of the oldest artistic materials, known for its malleability and for the fact that the drying process requires the artist to have a great deal of calm and patience – and the result can still offer surprises after the firing process. In combination with current topics and questions as well as a high aesthetic value that characterizes all of her art works, an edgy discrepancy arises that Rochell resolves in and with her artwork.
One of her current ceramic works is the roller-skating girl. Self-absorbed, she pirouettes on a mirror, which emphasizes the moment of self-reflection. She turns around herself, but does not look at the ground (which would not be good for her during a pirouette), but to the side over her shoulder. In combination with her right hand placed behind her back, this indicates the rotation with which she turns around herself again and again.
(Chris Gerbing)
Meggi Rochell
Winner of the NEW CERAMICS Prize at the 2024 Oldenburg Ceramics Fair, which includes a solo exhibition at the State Museum for Art and Cultur at Oldenburg Castle from 2 August – 14 September 2025
What would it be like not to first shape a vessel and then glaze it with colour, but to incorporate the colour from the very beginning? To treat the colour not as a surface application but as part of the form? To understand colour and form as one? For more than 30 years, Dorothee Wenz from Schwabenheim near Mainz has been doing just that: she builds vessels from coloured clay and porcelain bodies. She has worked with every imaginable colour, from tropical turquoise green to dry brick red to blue and yellow. She originally learned the technique through self-study, and only years later did she learn about a very similar tradition in Japan: erikomi.
Wenz colours her bodies herself using ceramic colourants. But she does not limit herself to single-coloured objects. The artist colours several bodies in various colours, flattens them, and stacks them on top of each other. This creates small, horizontally striped blocks of finely coordinated colours. The individual coloured stripes run slightly irregularly, creating a vibrant effect, as if the layers had grown naturally.
(Julie Metzdorf)
Dorothee Wenz
Until 21 September 2025
As I can already hear you say “Where?”, let’s first locate the museum! The Oppidum, or Gallic citadel in question, a mere thirteen kilometres west of Beziers, is probably both the least known yet the most intriguing of the many Gallic oppida in France. Essentially a defended granary dating back some two thousand six hundred years, it has turned out to be, ever since being discovered at the very end of the 19th century, a ceramic treasure trove of quite extraordinary diversity and wealth. And as a special bonus, this unique site is not alone but part of a breath-taking complex that includes the spectacular 13th century hydrological project that drained the Montady swamp, as well the justly famous 18th century Malpas tunnel on the Canal du Midi.
The quality of the Museum’s permanent ceramic collection, as well as the perfection of its presentation, makes it one of France’s most fascinating archaeological sites. As an additional attraction, the Museum proposes a major temporary exhibition throughout the summer months. Normally, the theme chosen explores an esoteric archaeological subject, like the Mongolian monoliths exhibited in 2024, so this year’s invitation to show the works of Pekka Paikkari, a major contemporary artist, can be seen as a remarkable initiative, born of the Director’s appreciation of the artist’s imaginative project that confounds contemporary creation with archaeological reality! What better way of constructing a nourishing dialogue between the present and the past than exhibiting the works of this visionary from the far north alongside the museum’s permanent collection?
(Nigel Atkins)
Last Feast – 40 ceramic bottles, stoneware – Photo by Chikako Harada, Helsinki
Contemporary ceramics from Denmark
Siegburg Municipal Museum
12 July – 31 August 2025
In this exhibition, the two renowned Danish ceramic artists, Stine Hagedorn Jespersen and Martin Bodilsen Kaldahl, present a selection of works that, at first glance, appear to be opposites, both in terms of scale and character: one relies on meticulous repetition with minute variations, the other allows the work to emerge intuitively from within itself to achieve an immediate physical, spatial effect.
Martin Bodilsen Kaldahl
Martin Bodilsen Kaldahl’s ceramics address inherent sculptural presence in space. They are fundamentally non-narrative but strongly emphasize the potential of the form itself to convey emotional content to the viewer. Through precise formal elaboration of the material, the artist attributes meaning to even the most casual and simple gesture in space, and with a keen eye for the monumental in the insignificant, he works to create the conditions for the creation of an intuitive spatial form.
Stine Jespersen
Stine Jespersen’s work is even more reductive, exploring the possibilities of clay through repetition and transformation. Starting with familiar geometric forms, her works are the result of a methodical exploration of the material, in which modular structures and subtle shifts lead to poetic forms of expression that emerge naturally or through a deliberate process.
Clay Knit vessels, stoneware, different sizes, 2023 – photo – Stine Jespersen
9 – 11 May 2025
There is a palpable sense of exuberance and excitement as you enter Ceramic Art London, enjoying its second year in its new home at London Olympia, and a personal sense of relief and achievement in actually arriving at one of London’s hardest to reach exhibition venues. Upon climbing the stairs, the visitor is not disappointed, the Craft Potters Association should be congratulated for creating a dynamic and welcoming event, ably supported by a phalanx of eager and enthusiastic student helpers. The bright and open space provides a great opportunity to see the work in its best light.
Ceramic Art London is the U.K.’s most prestigious ceramic art fair, in its 21st year. An event that is testament to the British public’s appetite for all things ceramic and representative of a burgeoning exponential interest on the back of a diversifying opening access to clay and tuition through private studios and popular television.
It’s great to return to the event, after missing a year, to be greeted by Chris Keenan’s elegantly potted porcelain tableware. Chris told me he has exhibited in every CAL but one. To witness Kyra Kane’s beautiful wheel-thrown porcelain vessels extended both in scale and emotional intensity of the surfaces. It’s reassuring to see Dylan Bowens expressive slipware speak to skilled artisanship and modern interpretations of tradition.
(Anthony Quinn)
Sun Jin Kim – Photo – A.Quinn
Kuniko Kinoto – Japan
Kuniko Kinoto (born 1976) worked at a noborigama (climbing kiln) site in Shigaraki, Shiga Prefecture, producing the famous tanuki (racoon dog) figurines. In 2001, she studied glaze techniques at Shigaraki Ceramic Research Institute. Inspired by friends studying ceramics at universities, she opened a workshop in Hiedaira and began her career as a ceramic artist. The richness of forms and phenomena in nature, as well as the partially dilapidated works of senior artist Machiko Ogawa, profoundly influenced Kinoto.
Melis Buyruk – Turkey
Melis Buyruk was born in Gölcük in 1984. Her large-scale ceramic works are exquisite and realistic combinations of numerous individual elements, including hundreds of flowers and hidden animals, reflecting the richness, harmony, and surprises of nature. The translucent porcelain conveys the lightness and delicacy of petals, with which she creates a tapestry of flowers, ingeniously reproducing the details of real ones.
(Ting-Ju SHAO)
Kuniko Kinoto – Japan
Melis Buyruk – Turkey
Andy, first of all we would like to hear about your ceramics background
My journey with ceramics began in my grandmother’s basement, where I watched her paint bisque figurines, sparking my early fascination with the medium. My father nurtured this passion, teaching me to paint and experiment with different finishes, laying the foundation for my lifelong love of ceramics.
Like many ceramic artists, I was drawn to more than just clay as a child – I loved to sketch. Drawing provided me with a sense of escapism, much like a gripping novel does for some. When I entered college, I initially pursued graphic design; however, it was clay that ultimately captured my soul. The potter’s wheel, though challenging, captivated me, opening endless possibilities for artistic exploration.
After earning a BFA in ceramics and drawing, I spent a year working at Red Star Studios in Kansas City, Missouri, deepening both my technical expertise and understanding of ceramics as a career. Further studies in sculpture and glaze development at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln ultimately led me to establish my own studio in northern Missouri. Through these experiences, I learned that pursuing your passion as a career was not only fulfilling but viable.
(Evelyne Schoenmann)
Andy Rogers
