Stir Cheat Sheet: 5 sweet ceramic studios to scope out at the Eastside Culture Crawl

Sleek black and white, ghostly forms, and “antiques for the future”

By Janet Smith

Ceramic pieces by Chu Chu

The Eastside Culture Crawl runs to November 21. Find COVID safety protocols here.

THE EASTSIDE CULTURE CRAWL swings opens the doors to its studios to vaccine-pass-toting art lovers all weekend—and amid the mix of media, there are some standout ceramics.

Pottery has never been hotter for home decor, and below, Stir scopes out just a few of the artists who are working at the wheel in cool new ways.

#1

Chu Chu (work pictured at top)
Pandora Studios

Basic black and white make for sleekly contemporary tableware. Think hand-marbling, carving, and silkscreening—all with a graphic-art sensibility. One of the standout series is Geometric Mountain, featuring jaggedy, diamond-like peaks again glossy-black or white. Tumblers feel great in your hands, and just picture a bunch of lemons or oranges in one of the high-contrast bowls.

#2

Antler Ceramics

Mergatroid Building

Artist Anthony Leonard Lyle, showing his work for the first time at the Crawl, upends and deconstructs traditional ceramic-making to create works that are a curiosity-sparking mix of the old and the space-age—or as Antler’s motto so cleverly puts it, “antiques for the future”. The Emily Carr University grad’s collection includes unusual carafes, candy-coloured mugs, and offbeat teapots with long, upturned spouts. For the star lover on your gift list, check out mugs emblazoned with hand-painted constellations like Orion.

James Kemp’s Hungry Ghost vase

#3

James Kemp

Eastside Atelier

Texture, colour, and form seem to morph in front of your eyes in the work of sculptor James Kemp. The Emily Carr University alumnus concentrates on studio process. As Kemp puts it in his artist statement, “Clay is the ideal medium for me because it responds to the impressions my body’s movement produces in the here and now.” Porous, with organic, bulbous shapes, his vessels feel almost phantasmagorical. On the other end of the spectrum are his popular Geo cups, with their mathematical, repeating polygonal lines.

The Daruma fox by eikcam ceramics

#4

Eikcam ceramics

Mergatroid Building

Artist Grace Lee’s work spans the functional and the whimsical—all with a minimalistic, high-design edge. On the tableware side, we love her scalloped dessert, side, and condiment plates, in subtle glazes of matte blush, matte black, and matte ochre. On the pure fun side, you have the Daruma fox to stand guard on a side table. Similar figures adorn fascinating clay curio boxes you can hang on the wall and decorate with all manner of dried flowers, shells, or other finds.

Matthew Freed’s Galiano Glaze.

#5

Matthew Freed

Jackson Five

The biggest draw with Freed’s work is his functional pottery’s incredible glazes. They range from the vibrant Galiano, a multitone blue that will make you think of the ocean, to the multihued Saltspring, setting glossy blasts from the spectrum against semi- matte charcoal. Elsewhere, Freed also handpaints intricate leaf and dogwood patterns that evoke a similar West Coast feel.

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