Art @ Work Today

At first in the footsteps of the pioneer generation of South African potters working in the style of the Anglo-Oriental school and later, standing in equal stature in the ranks of those who mastered and excelled in high-temperature reduction-fired stoneware and porcelain, such was the good fortune of some of the studio potters who emerged in the 1970’s. They would pursue their personal derivative of Anglo-Oriental form and function yet always staying true to its ethics and aesthetics. Speeding past them was the train of modernism with conceptual ceramic art as its destination wherein, warned the British potter Mike Dodd “lies the gates of hell and the prison of the heart.”1

Any young potter wishing to compete for recognition alongside the master potters Esias Bosch (1923 – 2010), Tim Morris (1941 – 1990), Hyme Rabinowitz (1920 – 2009), Bryan Haden and Andrew Walford, would have to excel in technical skills, be fully familiar with the available materials and technology, have artistic talent yet know that in the submission to the intrinsic forces of clay and fire, something greater than what was intended, must be born.

The young potters of the 1970s had numerous advantages on their side: tertiary-level schools of art where pottery was included in the syllabus, a profusion of private pottery schools, new study and reference material, apprenticeships, the living examples of the master potters, galleries intent on promoting pottery as a collectable craft/art and a consumer market infatuated with the appeal of hand-made functional ware. Chris Green was one of them.

Born in Johannesburg in 1953, Green had the extra benefit of the guidance of a potter mother who was also a respected pottery teacher, the friendship of Morris, exposure to production pottery environments and most of all, “… loved the process and was deeply emotionally involved with the miracle of it.” Over a quarter of a century he refined his craft, produced pieces of exemplary quality and of high artistic value for which he gained recognition but then, in 1997, abandoned it all.

The story of Green’s life and work is also in part the story of South African studio potteries and production studios in general. The former being that of the individual craft-potter-artist and the latter being an industrialised venture where large numbers of specific forms are created but not sacrificing originality nor quality.

Chris Green - A Good Start

It all started at an early age. While on holiday on the Natal south coast, the very young Green and his two sisters Carol and Anne would be kept occupied and entertained with yellow terracotta clay which their mother Ruth (1916 - 1981) would source from small local potteries. Ruth had more than a passing interest in pottery. In the early 1960’s she studied pottery under John Edwards (19?? - 1989) initially at the Johannesburg Art School in Bok Street and then at his pottery school in Fellside, Johannesburg. In 1969 she established her own studio in Bryanston, Johannesburg and enrolled pupils from the nearby Redhill High School for pottery classes along with her evening classes for adults. Chris’ first love was the outdoors and wildlife but in his final year of high school he did dabble with clay in Ruth’s studio, doing some slab work. In 1971 he was conscripted for military service in the South African Air Force and on completion of that, enrolled for his BA degree (majoring in English) at the University of the Witwatersrand. He graduated in 1977.

It was at this time that Green read the book The Complete Book of Pottery Making by the American master potter John B. Kenny. One of his other reference sources was Harry Memmott’s The Australian Pottery Book: A comprehensive Guide to Pottery with full-colour photo sequences of throwing pots on the wheel. For Green, it was these step-by-step photo guides that opened the window onto the universe of pottery. In between his studies at university, he had continued working in Ruth’s studio, concentrating on figurative work, coiling and slabbing. Kenny’s book prompted him to pay more attention to throwing on the wheel and soon he knew how to throw relatively proficiently. He was fortunate to secure a place in Edwards’ very last month of teaching before that studio was sold to Digby Hoets and afterwards he kept on throwing during his free time at Ruth’s studio.

By then Green was familiar with the work of Morris and Bosch which he had seen at Fernand Haenggi’s Studio 101 and at Helen de Leeuw’s gallery, both in Hyde Park, Johannesburg. Via a friend’s mother who was acquainted with Morris, Green was introduced to the master potter at his studio in Muldersdrift in August 1973. Morris was at work throwing oil and vinegar bottles with impressive ease, fluidity and flair on a self-made wheel:

“He was halfway through throwing a board of 20 bottles… it was a revelation… as though I was used to seeing it in grainy black-and-white but now saw it all in high-definition colour… a conjuring trick. At last I understood this pottery thing.”

He became a frequent visitor to the Morris studio and through observation of his management of his materials and his throwing, Green’ own skills at throwing grew by quantum levels sufficiently so that he became the throwing teacher at Ruth’s studio. Confident of his own skills, he made tentative enquiries in 1974 to work at the Morris studio but Morris who by then had some discouraging experiences with other journeymen and was intent on establishing himself as a studio potter rather than as a production potter, dismissed Green’ aspirations. In December 1974 he travelled to Canada on family matters but was able to visit several studio potters who had set up workshops along the lines of the Morris and Walford studios. At the time it would have been feasible to set up a studio on his own or begin work in another studio. He also seriously entertained the idea of dropping his final year courses at the University of the Witwatersrand and enrolling at either the Sheridan College of Art or the Georgian College in Ontario to do a studio art and design course. These courses were very well formulated and were run by faculty and guest artists, much like the famous Harrow Art School in England. However, the appeal of the South African climate and a large network of friends were far greater and he returned to South Africa in January 1975.

Kolonyama - Learning the Business

Buoyed by his success in Pretoria at the first member exhibition of the recently founded Association of Potters of Southern Africa (APSA) where one of three submitted pieces was accepted and then purchased for the Corobrik Collection, Green made a firm decision to pursue a career as a potter. His one option was to join the team at Liebermann Pottery (established in 1952) in Wynberg, Johannesburg but working in a mass production “factory” facility held little appeal as compared to the small studios of Morris and others. By chance Green heard of a pottery workshop that would be hosted at the Kolonyama studio in Lesotho over the Easter period in 1975 and he decided to attend.

Kolonyama was established in May 1969 by the philanthropist-sponsor Ian Dare (1935 – 1998) and Joe Finch of Winchcombe Pottery in England with the objective of teaching pottery skills to local people and creating an income-generating community project. The son of the acclaimed Raymond Finch who was schooled in the Anglo-Oriental tradition under Michael Cardew (1901 - 1983), Joe was well-versed in the production of functional ware. In essence, says Green, Kolonyama was intrinsically a very conservative model founded on the old English earthenware style of pottery that Cardew revived and transposed in stoneware. Winchcombe was one of many “old country potteries” in one form or another that managed to last throughout the industrial revolution by producing large volumes of skilfully-made, cheap utilitarian ware. There were others like it in the U.S.A. and Europe and certainly in abundance in Asia. Raymond Finch who bought the pottery from Cardew, continued and further developed that legacy and was aided by Sid Tustin (1913 – 2000) who had worked there as a young boy and with Cardew. Finch succeeded in his efforts to make Winchcombe a modern success by turning it into a production studio making tableware for the new middle classes of the 1950’s and 60’s who were after more personal products. Winchcombe made attractive, well-thrown and finished tableware in a smooth stoneware body that was fired with diesel and later wood, but still using many of the older, hand craft techniques. That is what Joe Finch brought to Kolonyama. Within a period of 18 months at Kolonyama, a down-draught oil kiln of 2.8m3 was built and the studio equipped with a blunger, filter-press and throwing wheels. On Joe’s return to England, Raymond briefly took over the reins followed by Malcolm Bandtock who taught at the Harrow School of Art, London and then by Bill van Gilder. By the time of Van Gilder’s residency, Kolonyama was producing 3 000 to 5 000 pots per month in earthenware, stoneware and porcelain with “house glazes” ranging from satin-white feldspathic to celadon green and earthy-brown. The slip-trailed designs and decorative brushwork in iron, cobalt and wood-ash were distinguishing features of Kolonyama pieces.2,3 Another English potter, Toff Milway, joined Kolonyama in the latter part of 1974.

At the Easter 1975 workshop which was attended by esteemed potters such as Rabinowitz and Bosch, Green made a sufficiently good impression on Van Gilder and Milway to be invited by them to work at Kolonyama during his mid-term university vacation and that was followed by an offer to be apprenticed for a six month period starting January 1976 to help fill the gap left by Van Gilder, who had accepted the job of starting up and managing the pottery studio at Mantenga Craft Centre in Ezulwini Valley, Swaziland. When he reported for duty, Green was told that it would only be a three month long apprenticeship. This fuelled his desire to learn and do as much as possible within the apprenticeship period. He worked extended hours principally as a member of the throwing team but was also allowed to work in all the other areas of the pottery which gained him broad experience of production business. Central to all was to throw at high speed but with accuracy and economy: “I learned to throw the shapes cleanly and they only needed minimal turning afterwards to neaten the foot and base… it was throwing with all of your skills and all of your concentration”. The guidance and background rationale for the whole process was provided by Milway who had worked at Winchcombe for some time before attending the Harrow Art School’s ceramics course prior to moving to Lesotho to assist Van Gilder. Milway’s broad experience and generous sharing of the historical background and explaining the market–related demands of running a production studio, were the foundation of Green’s future work.

Green - Learning with Morris I THINK “WORKING WITH MORRIS” WOULD BE BETTER

It was during this apprenticeship period that Morris offered Green the opportunity to work as a jobbing-thrower in his studio. Green would be throwing wine goblets for which he would earn 60 cents per piece. In April 1976, Green reported at the Morris studio and would work there until May in the following year when economic considerations forced Morris to lay off Green and two other apprentices. This was a period of honing his skills, says Green, who had to juggle university tutorials and assignments with his potting. It was also a period of being enriched with the knowledge of art, music, culture and life which Morris so generously shared. Morris had an altogether looser, more fluid way of throwing that was freer but just as fast as the tight production style of Kolonyama. He taught Green to have confidence in his work and to challenge himself in developing as a potter. In return, Green brought to the studio “my experience of production throwing at Kolonyama… the technique of making accurate form.” In time his throwing speed increased to “four mugs a minute” whereas Morris easily achieved five a minute whilst keeping up his non-stop banter about cricket, Mozart, the farm school or about the growing of vegetables. For the rest of 1977, Green worked as a shop fitter.

Matenga - Developing a Philosophy

The next significant event that would define him as a potter came when he was invited to a dinner hosted by Hoets with Bosch and Milway in attendance. Green was told that he was their choice of candidate to take over from Van Gilder as crafts manager at Mantenga. Green accepted and after a brief stay at the pottery before a briefer honeymoon in Canada with his wife Julie, he commenced work at Mantenga where he would stay until the end of that year. It was all about running a pottery business with the attendant technical challenges but also shaping his own philosophy about pottery. He re-read Michael Cardew’s Pioneer Pottery and found great value in the ceramic chemistry portions of the book. His first reading had focussed on the philosophical aspects of studio pottery. In Swaziland he was further exposed to several other designers and master craftspeople from Europe and the U.S.A. all of whom had a wealth of experience in the larger universe of the international craft and design markets. In this rich and stimulating environment he began to seriously explore the fundamentals of the modern expression of the Anglo-Oriental approach. He re-read Susan Peterson’s Sh?ji Hamada - A Potter’s Way and Work, Soetsu Yanagi’s (1889-1961) The Unknown Craftsman and A Potter’s Book by Bernard Leach (1887-1979) who along with Sh?ji Hamada (1894–1978) and Michael Cardew (1901 – 1983) are considered the founders of the Anglo-Oriental school.

Craftsman-Potter v Artist-Potter.

In reviewing his pottery up to then, Green described himself a craftsman-potter rather than an artist-potter: “I didn’t need to express myself… I just wanted to make good stuff… technically impeccable pieces.” By his standards, a pot if well-thrown did not need to be “dressed-up with fancy glazes.”

Another book which he read in 1980 that was to influence his studio practice was Dennis Parks’ A Potter’s Guide to Raw Glazing and Oil firing. Parks’ starts his book with a quote from The Horses Mouth by Joyce Carey that Green liked so well that he copied it out and stuck it up on his studio wall:

“B-but, Mr Jimson, I w-want to be an artist”
“Of course you do,” I said, “everybody does once. But they get over it, thank God, like the chicken-pox. Go home and go to bed and take some hot lemonade and put on three blankets and sweat it out.”
“But Mr J-Jimson, there must be artists.”
“Yes, and lunatics, and lepers, but why go and live in an asylum before you’re sent for? If you find life a bit dull at home,” I said,” and want to amuse yourself, put a stick of dynamite in the kitchen fire, or shoot a policeman. Volunteer for a test pilot. Or dive off Tower Bridge with five bob’s worth of roman candles in each pocket. You’d get twice the fun at about one-tenth of the risk”