Nicola Gillis

Based in Brighton, UK

Nicola Gillis works from her garden studio at her home in Brighton.

To seek balance from the fast pace of modern life, she creates vessels to enhance the everyday rituals. The first question she asks being ‘What would I like to use in my home to enhance those everyday pleasures of eating and drinking?’. She then guides the clay to create simple forms for everyday use, hoping to create a connection between her hands and the hands of the user.

Inspiration is found in both the natural and the manmade environment; rusted metal, flaking paint, stormy skies, wood polished by the sea or by human hands over years of use... The organic marks on her pieces reflect this and are applied with oxides and slips before being fired.

Exploring the environment further she experiments with collecting local clay - from Whitstable beach, Ashdown Forest and Sheepcote Valley, close to Brighton, and Ash and Sycamore wood ash in her glazes.

Nicola's work is robust and tactile, the clay is warm and the mugs are especially inviting and long to be cupped in the hand.