Rowena Gilbert’s ceramic work is a celebration of the natural world informed by her travels and her coastal home town of Brighton.
Following a trip to Thailand, experiments with new colour palettes led to an unintentional spread of hundreds of turquoise blue swatches spread out in her studio like tiny tiles.
Rowena, daughter of fine artist Terence Gilbert, was creating art with felt tip pens from a very young age. She developed a love of ceramics while studying at Christ’s Hospital in Horsham.
Her art teacher was a collector of contemporary fine art ceramics and to be taught by someone so passionate about ceramics was a massive influence on Rowena.
In her shared Brighton Studio – set up with a Princes Trust Loan – Rowena creates unique bowls, vases and lamp stands.Her work fuses simplistic line with muted colours and a range of surface textures.
Rowena casts each piece with a colour clay body, then brushes layers of coloured clay slips both on the inside and outside of the vessel. This part of the process can take several weeks as the clay must dry slowly to prevent cracking.
She uses metal tools to cut through the layers in a method following the principles of sgraffito ceramics before glazing and firing the final pieces.
Despite 14 years working with clay professionally, Rowena has not lost her love of the medium. She finds the clay magical and elemental, malleable and versatile, which gives her the freedom to express herself in an endless variety of ways.
Follow Rowena over on Instagram and pop in soon to see her collection for us for CHRISTMAS AT HEART.
