Common Cause
What a fantastic week we have had, a confluence of confluences, the opening of Common Cause at Brantwood and the launch of our first book Confluences. It has been the coming together of so many different strands of our lives. Introducing Bernard Leach’s Grandson to Shoji Hamada’s Grandson was a very beautiful moment. A tiny corner of ceramic history. Not surprisingly we have been doing some reflection about how these things come together.
History
When Martin returned to The Lake District, returning to working with clay seemed a natural progression. He wanted to build on his love of Japanese and Korean techniques and approaches, embracing natural materials. He also wanted to make his work more accessible, for it to become part of people’s lives, for it to have use, and to feel important to them.
When Martin was first invited to exhibit his work at Brantwood, he wanted to present the important impact of Japan on his practice, as well as the ideas that the true artist is the observer and that we all imbue meaning into our objects of utility. Over the last 2 years as Martin built the body of work for Common Cause it became obvious that much of this meaning was wrought through the inspiration of the landscape, and the waste materials we craft into glazes.
The People
It also became obvious that there were a lot of thoughts that needed a life beyond the exhibition.
We were privileged to have met Euan Adamson through our involvement with Daniel Lacey and Spring Fling. Euan is more than a photographer, he is a sculptor with time and light: a digital magician who has the artistry to play with our attention whilst never leaving us in doubt about what is important in the image before our eyes.
Geoff Cox, is a poet and playwright, working with words to explore the rich descriptive veins that flow beneath the Cumbrian landscape: developing narratives that extend the ancient relationships that tie people to place. He came into our lives through the magic of Twitter and the happenstance of location brought poet Geoff Cox, as a neighbour to our Lupton Studio.
The Concept
Martin had been writing Haiku style poems with the intention of displaying them alongside his work at Common Cause.
Increasingly he had felt that this missed the point of encouraging people to consider his work from differing perspectives. Asking Geoff to wrap his words around Martin’s practice seemed the perfect solution. Asking Euan to capture the images that he could see in the work, its inspiration and creation without input or influence was equally perfect.
Once we started talking the collaboration took off; Confluences is a book born of connections and confluences of ideas, places and people.
Your Confluence of Confluences
You can buy your own copy herehttps://milesmooreceramics.com/confluences-book/