Katharine Barker has spent most of her life working with textiles, so moving into the world of ceramics, around five years ago, was partly a step into the unknown, but also a chance to start and think afresh, with new shapes, colours and textures.  While learning her new craft, she has explored themes of balance, relationships between geometric shapes, how groups of free standing shapes can form their own dialogue and create more than the sum total of the whole.  Current political issues drive some of her work, a chance to let off steam, but most of her work is simply shapes, which create their own story. In terms of surface treatment, Katharine is currently experimenting with metal oxides to create naturalistic, stone-like effects.
Katharine.texcons@btinternet.com, 01926 613615
http://associationofmidlandartists.org.uk/katharine-barker/

I am hoping to show my piece, “3 x 3” (Three by Three), a set of nine square plates, arranged in a square, at the allotments.  They currently hang on my garden fence, but would work well on a plain, wooden shed wall.  They are made of a neutral, beige coloured clay and have freely applied trails and splashes of a white, “volcanic” glaze across them.  The combination of the mathematical and seemingly random, can be seen throughout the allotments, from geometric patterns (squares and hexagons in wire fencing and number series evident in plant growth, to the randomness of the uncultivated and wind blown.
 
On my visit to the allotments, I was drawn to the little insect/bee houses made with grouped lengths of bamboo, forming a series of tunnels for hibernation.  I feel that this could develop into a sculptural piece using extruded clay – early days.