Untitled

The German-born ceramist Ruth Duckworth lived and worked in England from the mid-1930s, producing sculptures in metal and clay before turning to functional ceramic wares. In this preference she followed British studio potter Bernard Leach (1887–1979) who made well-made, affordably priced utilitarian pottery that was inspired by Asian and medieval English craft traditions. A postwar generation of American potter-artists active in California in the 1970s, including Peter Voulkos (1924–2002), also influenced ceramic artists working in England. By 1960, Duckworth shifted from symmetrical wheel-thrown forms to hand-built and sculptural structures, moving these pieces beyond the idea of vessel or container. Duckworth challenged or abandoned notions of real or potential domestic utility, choosing instead to handle clay in an expressionistic manner. She relocated permanently to the United States in 1964 to teach for one year at the fine arts program at the University of Chicago, where she ultimately remained until 1966, and where she also taught from 1968 to 1977. In Chicago, she fully formed a new direction in her work, in sculptural vessels as well as small reliefs and large-scale murals based on the modernist principles of organic abstraction, an artistic style that uses forms found in nature.

About the Artwork

Around 1960, Ruth Duckworth chose an alternate way of thinking about and making ceramics. After working for a number of years in London producing functional wares, she followed her personal inclination for sculptural ceramics based on the modernist principles of organic abstraction. Like other potters in England at the time, she abandoned wheel-thrown shapes for hand-built forms. She made craggy hemispheres of collaged slabs of clay, enlivened by visible suturelike joints. Made in 1964, this intimate, handheld bowl pushes this direction in her work. It is among either the last pieces Duckworth made in England, or the first she produced after relocating to Chicago. Many traces of the hand can be seen over its final rough and highly textured surfaces, which seem to celebrate the process of manufacture. Since this is a sculptural piece rather than a utilitarian vessel, its rough interior serves a purely expressionist intention. With such works, Duckworth established her reputation. Her thoughtful, varied approach to the form of the container forms included taking full advantage of the plastic and soft  qualities of clay. She soon extended this direction to large mural commissions.