ABOUT THE ARTIST

Upon being asked to identify key sources of inspiration for COVET, Frances Palmer immediately thought of George Ohr and his enormous passion for form. She admires the way his loose approach of  letting the clay express itself, and allowing the form to emerge.

This inspires me. I’m interested in exploring form and the process of changing ideas into form.

 

Palmer also sees the Shaker aesthetic as particularly compelling—their attention to detail, to craft and to the art of material.

Both George Ohr and the Shakers are ‘masters of their domains’—classic, American, timeless. I wanted to honor their approach, to create work as an homage to what they achieved with form.

 

Since the Shakers were not potters, Palmer allowed herself to imagine what form pottery by a Shaker might become—let it evolve. She chose brown stoneware to invent her set of Shaker-inspired pottery…

 

I don't make or grow objects to hold onto them. I enjoy the process, and then I send the product of the process—the object—out into the world for others to live with and enjoy.