Featured Maker: Lorna Yabsley
Featured Maker: Lorna Yabsley
11 January - 26 February 2022
Lorna Yabsley is a multi-disciplinary creative; she is an established professional photographer and author. Now in her mid-fifties, she is pursuing her life-long love of making, collaborating, and developing her skills as a ceramic artist.
To date she has, made design orientated work that clearly sits in the digital domain. She challenges herself to create highly refined and complex pieces, pushing the technical limits of established craft practice and combines this with the traditional time-honoured techniques of the studio designer maker.
Interested in re-interpreting and subverting familiar, long established iconic themes, she creates work that is grounded in rigorous research. She is often drawn to the figurative and is heavily influenced in her strength of experience as a photographer of people and is a practiced and acute observer.
She continues to explore and expand her practice, with the aim to evolve highly refined works for the high-end art market.
Whilst studying for her BA part time at Plymouth College of Art, she continued to run her photographic practice and published her latest book The Photography Ideas Book for The Tate in 2019. In her second year, she won an award with The British Arts Medal Society, for her work highlighting the issue of breast cancer titled ‘Be Breast Aware’ Plymouth College of Art has tipped her as ‘One to Watch’, and was invited to take part in The Crafts Councils ‘Future Edit’ in 2020.
This is new work, and a complete departure from my previous highly technical digital work. A pure indulgence in hand building. These naïve nautical representations are inspired by my love of all things boating.
I resent the commercial pressure of being type cast in my creative endeavours. As an emerging maker, I am still finding my way, and am enjoying exploring and learning. I have always been a maker, a professional photographer and writer, I am living a creative life and consider myself very lucky.
Quay Terracotta, high fired with terra sigillate and waxed
Rack Brass with verdigris patina sealed and waxed
Boats Slip cast bone china
Buoys Porcelain with terra sigillate/neon paint and waxed
Oars Porcelain and terracotta
Chains Distressed bronze
Wedge Porcelain
instagram@lornayabsley