A love of Raku

Raku originated in 16th century Japan, where it was closely connected to the tea ceremony and valued for its simplicity, immediacy, and intimate relationship with the maker. In contemporary practice, raku has evolved into a dynamic firing process that embraces change and transformation. Pieces are removed from the kiln while glowing hot and placed into reduction materials, allowing smoke, flame and oxygen to mark the surface. The resulting crackles, metallic flashes, and smoky traces are unique to each firing, recording a moment where earth, fire and air meet.

Pottery by it's nature is unpredictable and Raku embraces this with its rapid heating and cooling of vessels. In the quiet tension between earth and flame, form awakens. The vessels become a witness to alchemy - clay breathing, smoke whispering, fire remembering. Each mark and metallic shimmer is a dream left by heat, a trace of transformation where the elements meet and dissolve into one another often with spectacular results.

Through Raku's unpredictable dance, the work carries the memory of its making -

earth dreaming itself to light.