Show 5 Retrospective

‘Show 5’ was initiated by the Crafts Council as 5 retrospectives of artists: Carol McNicoll, Jim Partridge, Michael Rowe, Ann Sutton and myself and consisted of nearly 100 works. The key question became how to explain and exhibit continuous creative activity, identifying shifts in the career of a ceramic artist spanning thirty years (c1970-2003), which contribute to the art/craft debate in contemporary ceramics (see also The Secret History of Clay, Tate Liverpool, 2004).

Consequently, I selected work mapping my exploration of this relationship. Furthermore, although it was a ‘retrospective’, I wanted to emphasize the continuous dialogue of themes in my work as ongoing. They include: hearts, ornaments, plants and are contextualized as artwork, politics and popular culture. A graphic timeline was devised using drawings selected from contemporaneous sketchbooks.

Works from this retrospective were acquired by the Crafts Council, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, and the Walker Art Gallery (both with support from National Arts Collection Fund), The Potteries Museum and Art Galley (with Contemporary Art Society support) and the V&A.</p></p>

Artist Profile

Richard Slee's career as a studio ceramicist now spans over thirty years. Born in 1946 in Cumbria, he attended Carlisle College of Art and graduated in Ceramics from the (then) Central School of Art and Design in 1970. Early career consisted of part-time teaching and practice as a Studio Ceramicist; he was awarded an MA in Design from the Royal College of Art in 1988.

Slee started teaching at Camberwell College of Art in 1990, and was awarded professorship in 1992. Throughout his career he has built an international presence in the USA, Canada, Korea, Japan, Australia and Europe, with his work being represented in numerous collections world-wide.

He completed a major commission for Sculpture at Goodwood in 2000, and in the following year was awarded The Jerwood Applied Arts Prize for his contribution to contemporary Ceramics. In 2002, he curated the exhibition 'Sleepers' at The Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro, as part of the Ceramica International Festival. In 2006, he received an Arts Council Individual Artist Award to further his practice.

Richard Slee is represented in the United Kingdom by Barrett Marsden Gallery, London.

Artist’s Statement

"Specializing in ceramics as the medium, my interests and practice has evolved from Studio Pottery to a contemporary craft debate with reference to the current positioning of material specializations in visual creativity. Recent developments in my output have seen the use of both the found and non-ceramic materials in works produced questioning past loyalties towards a single material.

A formal exploration of the creative use of fired enamels onto metal has been recently undertaken, to expand my personal craft knowledge. The resulting works challenge both the place and purpose of individually produced and crafted works."

• http://www.richardslee.com
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/collective/A260...
• http://www.icon-magazine.co.uk/issues/01...
• http://www.craftscouncil.org.uk/Exhib/ri...
• http://www.media.uwe.ac.uk/nevac/rslee.h...
• http://www.bmgallery.co.uk
• http://www.sculpture.org.uk/biography/Ri...
• http://www.photostore.org.uk/seCVPG.aspx...