Karen Banks
Black Small Vessel with Five ‘Thorns’.
H: 3.6cm D: 4.5cm
 
Karen works with clay as a way of returning to the natural world. Each piece begins as a gesture of remembering—of walking, gathering, noticing. Childhood hours spent roaming woodland paths and Northumbrian shores taught her to look for what has been shaped slowly: a stone smoothed by tide, a form weathered to bone. Those early collections of small, precious things became a way of holding experience. That same impulse continues in the making of her vessels. They are meant to feel unearthed rather than made—objects that could have been found on a shoreline, drawn from the ground, and carried in a pocket.
The vessel is a recurring form for Karen: interior and exterior in conversation, shelter and exposure. Being drawn to contrasts—the coarse, aged texture of a surface against the soft, polished interior revealed within. Smoke firing deepens this sense of the elemental. Fire and air surrender their own markings, so no two pieces are ever the same—only kin.
Working from her small garden studio, surrounded by the quiet seasons of the land.
 
Care of Smoke Fired Ceramics
Smoke Fired Ceramics should be treated like watercolours. They should not be displayed in direct sunlight such as on a window sill, which could in time cause some of the more subtle tones to fade. The freshly polished burnished areas will in time lose their high glossy sheen, but this can be restored by a gentle polish with a soft cloth.
The vessels are to be enjoyed for display only, not as drinking vessels.