One of the other things I did this weekend was visit the last day of the British Ceramics Biennial, held partly in the abandoned, decaying Spode Works in Stoke. The idea, I guess, is to prove that there's still life in the industry, but the effect was double-edged. Much of the art ceramic referenced postmodernism and deconstruction: 'impossible' angles and loops - beautiful in many ways, but somewhat mocking of a town which lost hundreds of thousands of jobs when mass British pottery died. Deconstruction's all very witty when you're an art student - not so funny when you're out of a job. Much of the show's effect was derived from setting new artisan work against the smashed remains of a mass industry.
But I shouldn't cavil: my photographic hobby of finding beauty in post-industrial wreckage is equally decadent, and as I said, much of the artistic work is simply lovely. Full set of photos
here, click these samples to enlarge.
I do love a bit of typography - this from Staffordshire University's Flux studio
'Human Relations'
On the scrapheap…
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