Crafted with Atmosphere and Elements of Home
Georgia Wilkins working on the potter’s wheel at Kootenay School of the Arts
Functional Pottery Shines in Georgia Wilkins’s Earth Tone
By Nancy Saunders
For two weeks in June, Co.Lab Gallery + Arts Centre will host Earth Tone, a solo exhibition by local ceramic artist Georgia Wilkins. The show features pieces Wilkins made over two months at Medalta, a museum and contemporary ceramics centre in Medicine Hat, Alberta, through its renowned International Artist in Residence program.
Wilkins studied ceramics at the Kootenay School of the Arts in British Columbia. “I was trained around other functional potters, and those are most of the people who I've continued to connect with as I've worked with clay,” she explains. She encountered a new experience at Medalta, where she found herself surrounded by mostly sculptors. “That was honestly a big surprise. Most people [there] […] didn't really put a thought to functional works. They're more in the world of art, and I think I align more with the world of craft, with an artful approach.”
Wilkins at the Kootenay School of the Arts final show and sale in 2024
Wilkins says that being around others “who were using clay in such a different way” led to some doubts about whether showing functional ware is “enough.” Her renewed conviction that “it is a meaningful contribution, and functional, handmade art its role” is reflected across Earth Tone’s collection of wheel-thrown, useful pieces: cups, bowls, bottles, vases, and other familiar household forms. Wilkins believes that everyday use can deepen our awareness of the materials that shape our lives. “The connection between the objects we use and the materials that they're made from [is] an important piece to me,” she explains.
Using Medalta’s 16-cubic-foot gas soda kiln, Wilkins gained new experience in atmospheric firing, a process where the atmosphere inside the kiln actively affects the surface of the work. “What I like so much about atmospheric firing is that you're collaborating with the specific path of the flame; and the way that the flame moves through the kiln is affected by the way that you've loaded the kiln, and it's affected by the weather outside, or the atmospheric pressure. I love that collaboration and kind of lack of control.”
Vase, stoneware with Lake Superior sand, painted with slip (clay) from the Wolf River, and soda fired in reduction
While Wilkins’s pieces were created in Alberta, their materials root them firmly in Northwestern Ontario: porcelain mixed with Lake Superior sand creates subtle speckling, iron-rich Wolf River clay overlays surfaces with warm, grainy tones, and ash from a friend’s sauna stove transformed into natural glaze during firing. “The work is really about memory, and the way that I can infuse my memories and my love for the land and the waters that I call home into my pottery,” Wilkins says.
Wilkins works from her home studio in Thunder Bay. She plans to continue experimenting with local materials and hopes to eventually build her own wood kiln.
Georgia Wilkins Ceramics can be found at the Clay Collective, and @GeorgiaWilkinsCeramics on Instagram. Earth Tone will be on display from June 19 to July 8.
