David Gundry

I make wood-fired, hand-thrown, stoneware vessels for the home – mainly for the table and kitchen. A wide range of domestic and studio pieces, using traditional glazes such as tenmocho, celadons, cobalt blue, ash green, copper red etc – all exhibited in a light, airy, oak-framed studio.

My pottery is made on Dartmoor, from Cornish clay fired with Devon wood. I hope my pots, as do those of other societies, find some honest synthesis as a reflection of my own culture. Above all I hope they nourish! Pottery is my chosen work because I feel most in tune with it. I enjoy making pots. Others prefer visual, conceptual or experimental media.

Pottery must be one of the most ancient activities, as people have always needed to eat and at some point – presumably becoming bored with raw food, or needing to make it more palatable, they started to experiment with the application of heat. He – or most probably she – then made clay vessels to cook, serve, eat from and store food. She explored her environment, dug earth, cleaned and slaked it before moulding and firing it. She then cooked the food and served it to her family. Over time different forms evolved to serve both common needs and divergent expressions of feeling. I have been fortunate to share food with people in their homes, from the banks of the Amazon to the mountains of Ethiopia. From the high Himalayas to the islands of the Pacific. The pots were all different but they were all unselfconscious expressions of their cultures, and all provided sharing and nourishment.