Alwyn O’Brien receives the
2012 North-West Ceramics Award

By Amy Gogarty

At the very successful and festive fundraising
gala, From Oven and Kiln, held on April 19,
Alwyn O’Brien was presented with NWCF
Award of $5000. In 2009, the prize was
awarded jointly to Ian Johnston and Lisa
Henriques. The award recognizes a ceramic
artist who has resided and worked in B.C.
for at least five years, who has exhibited his or
her work publicly and who has demonstrated
an ongoing commitment to the ceramics
community. O’Brien was selected by a panel
consisting of board member and ceramic artist
Sarah Coote, former board member and senior
artist Tam Irving, and Burnaby Art Gallery
curator/director Darrin Martens. The award
is made with no conditions or responsibilities
attached in the certain knowledge that the
artist knows best how to use it.

Alwyn O'Brien was born on Salt Spring
Island to a family of makers and gardeners.
She studied at Capilano College in North
Vancouver; at Sheridan College, under
Bruce Cochrane and Susan Low-Beer; at
NSCAD with Julia Galloway, and at Emily
Carr University, where she worked with Paul
Mathieu. In 2010, she completed her MFA
at the University of Washington in Seattle. In
2011, she was one of five artists nominated
for the RBC Emerging Artist Award, which
involved creating a new work for exhibition at
the Gardiner Museum in Toronto. Her work
was featured at NCECA in Seattle both at the
Convention Center and in a solo exhibition,
Essay in Objects, at the James Harris Gallery. A

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Hold My Hand and We'll Swab the Decks One Last Time, 2012. Porcelain with Glaze.
36.5 x 52 x 36 cm.

piece of her work was recently purchased. by Desire is a transformational condition; it

the Seattle Art Museum. is a responsiveness to hunger, a longing to

Her newest work is characterized by an become at once undone and done. Ridusse

exuberant proliferation of looping, hand- a Frittata means "to make a mess". The

rolled ceramic coils, which emerge from ambiguous object: a passage, a mishap, an

the surface of the vessel to create elaborate, effluxion, a treatise of fragments.

expressive tangles. As O’Brien describes it,

“The surface has become the object rather Please join us in congratulating Alwyn

. O’Brien on the Award and on her impressive
than the decoration. It has become free of P

; . . .. work to date. We all look forward to even
the vessel’s three-dimensional form, and is

ae . reater things to come.
able to claim its own space.” These fragile & §

: «4s :
yet agitated excrescences “act like moving yy more on the NWCE please see their website

tendrils, creating the appearance of motion, at www.nwef.ca. For more of Alwyn work

destruction, and despair.” Speaking about a please see the James Harris Gallery website at
http://jamesharrisgallery.com/2012/03/

alwyn-obrien/

recent work, Ridusse A Frittata, she writes:

Gallery of BC Ceramics: Featured Artist

PGBC member Jan Formby is the Gallery's featured artist May 15 to June 14. Jan was,
born in Vancouver and is a potter, sculptor and oil painter. After graduating from Kootenay
School of Art and Design in 1999, Jan opened Red Moon Clay Studio and Gallery in the
historic city of Nelson. She is best known for her pottery production line of wildlife and sports
mugs. While her clay and sculptural bronze pieces tend to depict nature themes realistically,
her oil paintings wander and take landscape into abstract and mysterious realms.

Between the years 1999 and 2011 Formby has exhibited eleven times showing cohesive
bodies of oil paintings, pottery, clay and bronze sculptures in popular Nelson venues. Her
production line of image mugs are sold from the Coast to the Rockies as an all seasons
best seller. Contact: Red Moon Gallery 724 Herridge Lane (Studio+Gallery), Nelson, B.C.
red.moon@telus.net

Sea horse vase, 23cm x 17.5 cm x 12.5cm, porcelain, Cone 9.

Potters Guild of BC Newsletter - May 2012 7