andy priestman

Wood fired ceramics and abstract paintings. Professional Member of the Craft Potters Association. I have lived and worked at Minniwick, S.W.Scotland,. since 1973 and have been posting to this tumblr since 2011. It is a photographic record of my creative process. All photos are mine unless otherwise stated. The pottery and studio are surrounded by oak woods, birch and Scots pine, and the upland terrain of the Galloway Hills. Clays, slips and glazes are refined and adjusted from firing to firing, as new materials are introduced. Ball clays from Dorset and Devon make up most of the two stoneware bodies I mix by hand,but the colour and textures are achieved by adding, or using as slips, local low- firing clays and Ayrshire fireclays, along with the granite sand of Loch Neldricken. Glazes are based on simple clay/wood ash and clay/ limestone combinations, along with feldspar, quartz and Cornish stone. The glazes that were developed in the early days of high fired ceramics in China, Korea and Japan are an inspiration. The pots are fired with timber from a sawmill 24 miles away, to 1300C in a three chambered kiln. The wood burnt is offset by the 250 broad leaf trees I have planted. I develop my paintings in groups and series, using oil-based pigments and gesso grounds, principally on 50% cotton paper.