About Marina

MARINA RANDALL M.A.

 

My ceramics are created in the moment, using bold brush strokes and colours, subtle layers and diverse textures, inspired by mood, memory and the vessel’s shape, each piece evocative of beautiful landscapes or scenes, making each piece unique.

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Growing up in Mallorca and the Western Cape, I had an artistic upbringing, as my father was a painter and my mother was a photographer and potter. I was deeply affected by the wonderful proliferation of plants and animals which inhabit an amazingly diverse landscape, from the rugged bays of the coast to the rolling hills of the winelands, presided over by imposing mountain ranges. This is how my love of nature and open landscape began.

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I first trained and worked as a graphic artist in Cape Town, then I had the opportunity to travel extensively through southern Africa and to work as a safari guide.

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I raised my family in England but I have never lost my love of the outdoors and of nature. I live in the Surrey Hills, where the varied landscape changes continually as the seasons progress.

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In my early work, I explored traditional African techniques, hand-coiling clay pots, burnishing with pebbles, then firing them outside using organic materials to achieve serendipitous textures and earthy colours. I continued the African theme when I studied for my MA at UCA, using traditional sawdust firing where the pot surface captures the magical smoke patterns.

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After my MA, I changed direction to further develop techniques for using oxides and vitreous slips. This enabled me to use painterly effects in order to capture the essence of scenes in abstract form on the clay, where memories of the past inform visions of the present.

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I’m constantly exploring and learning. But after years, though, I still find a real joy in opening the kiln; only then does each piece reveal its story.