SURFACE TENSION
Bridget Macklin
28 June- 16 July 2023
Artists Talk: 15 July 2023 2.30pm in conversation with Anna Bingham.
A solo show by ceramicist Bridget Macklin presenting innovative works which incorporate found materials and images from specific localities in a ceramic exploration of fragility.
Bridget’s work demonstrates her desire to tell the story of our landscape and the way that we relate to it and focusing on the relationships between the geology and ecology of a place and those species with which we share the planet. Some of the work will reference the structure and fabric of the gallery, whilst other pieces will consider the spirit of optimism demonstrated by redevelopment projects which invite sustainable relationships with wildlife.
Bridget is interested in the simplicity of form, creating experimental work, and often using unglazed clay. She starts each unique piece from pure porcelain, with its connotations of beauty, value and fragility. To this she adds found materials and images, delighting in experimenting and in taking risks, She strives for ever thinner work which only reveals its full nature on closer inspection. Work is high fired to bring out the translucence of the porcelain and to flux or burn any inclusions. This causes pressure within the piece and results in distortions, craters, blisters and exploding splinters of rock, the impacts of which appear as points of tension.
A sense of place is important to Bridget, and her works are installed not only in gallery spaces, but in outdoor and in site specific contexts and museums to tell the story of the location.
Following a Diploma in Ceramics at City Lit in London (2015), Bridget Macklin is now studying for a Masters in Fine Art (Finishing 2023) for which this exhibition is the final project. Having been brought up in Richmond she now lives and works in St Mawes, Cornwall. Solo shows: Lepidoptera, Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro (2023) Prizes / Residencies: 2015: Winner, People’s choice, Salisbury Open Ceramics Exhibition, Shortlisted Jerwood Visual Arts Bursary (2017), Shortlisted Royal Arts Prize (2017), Longlisted Visual Art Open(2017), Accepted as full member Design Nation (2017). She has exhibited in Royal Academy Summer Exhibition (2022) and is shown at Tregony Gallery, Cornwall, Tonic Gallery, Salcombe and The Last Supper Gallery in Battersea. She was accepted as a full member Make Southwest in 2022.
