The natural world continues to inform my practice in surprising new ways. I have become invested in the slow meditative practices of growing, tending, foraging and harvesting. I use traditional skills like casting, gilding and engraving to create contemporary sculptural objects and jewellery.

My experience of the landscape is tied to the objects collected in it. I have found a need to record things and my work forms a kind of alternative diary of the seasons. I am interested in the ability of craft to open up a poetic space for knowledge to exist.

I spent part of my childhood living in a museum. Since that time I have been fascinated by collections and how things are protected, curated and displayed. My work is about the impulse to collect but also in turn it is made to be part of a collection, to have a dialogue with the things it is placed next to.

As a maker of small objects, touch is a reoccurring theme in my work. There is an enduring pleasure in living with handmade things.

My work explores the quiet poetry of the everyday.

1974 born in Sheffield, lives and works in Whitby, UK

Academic Information

1999 MA Art in Context, University of Sunderland

1996 BA (hons) 3D Design (glass with ceramics), University of Sunderland

2004-2007 Visiting lecturer for the MA Glass course at the University of Sunderland

Selected Awards

2021’Time, Space, Money’, bursary from Artists Newsletter

2021 Print Bursary working with Northern Print, Arts Council England

2019 ‘Developing Your Creative Practice’, Arts Council England

2016 Fellowship with the National Glass Centre, Sunderland and the Barbican, London

2012 Queen Elizabeth Trust Scholar

Selected Residencies

Residency exploring wearability and glass with North Lands, Scotland, Ruthin Craft Centre, Wales and the National Glass Centre, Sunderland

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2024 ‘Earthly Treasures’, Ruthin Craft Centre, Wales

2022 ‘Natural Selection’, Northern Print, Newcastle upon Tyne

2021 ‘12 weeks 12 artists’, New Art at Home project Space, London, including Sunday Salon artist’s talk

Selected Exhibitions

2023 ‘CO//ECT’, Somerset House, London

2023 ‘Solid Matter’ (As Above, So Below), Gallagher & Turner, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK

2023 ‘Uncommon Beauty, Objects of Curiosity and Wonder’, Craft in the Bay, Cardiff, Wales

2023 ‘Gravur on Tour’ (modern European glass engraving), Glass Museum, Gernheim, Germany

2023 ‘From Little Acorns…’, jewellery collaboration with Emily Georgina Jones, the Reading Room, Whitby, UK

2022 ‘Fungi ‘Cast’ in Time’ a Fungarium of cast and gilded glass mushrooms, Armitt Museum and Library, Lake District, to accompany Beatrix Potter’s watercolours of fungi

2022 ‘Coburg Glass Prize 2022’, Germany. The most important competition for Contemporary Glass in Europe

2022 ‘Inaugural International Bead Biennale’, jewellery collaboration with Emily Geogina Jones, part of the International Festival of Glass, Stourbridge

2022 ‘Earth Sea Sky’, London Glass Blowing, London

2022 ‘Drawn to Nature’, New Art at Home, London

2022 ‘The Art of the Exceptional’ Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust show, part of the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations, Fortnum & Mason, London

2021 ‘NGC Glass Prize’, the first European glass prize at the National Glass Centre

2020 ‘Gallery + Artisans’, a group show of artists selected to be part of the HOMO FABER guide a new digital platform, Gallery TEN, Edinburgh

2020 selected by the Michelangelo Foundation to be part of the new HOMO FABER guide, a digital platform dedicated to master artisans and rising talent in Europe

2019 Ireland Glass Biennale, Dublin Castle, Ireland

2019 ‘Useful/Beautiful, Why Craft Matters’, Harewood House, Leeds

2019 ‘QEST’ event, showing work with other scholars, V&A, London

2019 ‘NGC21’, National Glass Centre, Sunderland, UK

2018 ‘Peace und Freedom’, Waldmuseum, Zwiesel, Germany

2018 ‘Loud & Clear’, the Harley Gallery, Nottinghamshire, UK

2017 ‘and they engrave happily ever after …’, Glasmuseum Immenhausen, Germany

2017 ‘In Bloom’, with Elizabeth Blackadder, Gallagher & Turner, Newcastle upon Tyne

2016 ‘Transparent Femininity’, I co curated this exhibition with Julia Stephenson for the long gallery at the National Glass Centre

2016 ‘From Black to White and Back Again’, London Glassblowing, London, UK

2014 ‘Coburg Prize for Contemporary Glass 2014’. Coburg, Germany

2013 ‘New Glass – Ancient Skill, Contemporary Artform’. ‘Blackwell House’, Cumbria

2010 ‘Remarkable Glass’. Contemporary Applied Arts, London

2005 ‘Surface, Structure, Shape’, with the Crafts Council at the Axis Gallery, Tokyo

2002 ‘Sacred Geometry’ solo show, Centre Culturel, Saint-Yrieux-la-Peche, France

Collections

Bradford Museums and Galleries, UK, through the Contemporary Art Society

The National Glass Centre, Sunderland, UK

The Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead, UK

Various private collections in the UK and Europe.

Selected Participatory Projects

2020 ‘DesignLab Nation’, a partnership with the V&A and the National Glass Centre

2013 ‘Writing Britain’, working in collaboration with Newcastle City library and the British Library and young people from the Skimstone Artists’ Collective

Selected Commissions

2015 ‘Drawing by the Agency of Light’, St.Andrews University. I created a series of cast glass sculptural lenses set in granite that responded to a poem written by Jacob Polley

2012 ‘A Canvas for St. Ann’s’. screen printed artwork that covered the side of the building, Nottingham. working with NHS Nottingham City. Architect: CPMG

2011 ‘Baddiley- Clarke’. I created two cast glass sculptures for the Institute for Cell and Molecular Biology at Newcastle University. I also made a small sculptural piece for Nobel prize winning Paul Nurse who opened the building

2011- 2016 Various sculptural projects for Marie Curie Hospices in Newcastle upon Tyne, Solihull and Penarth: Architect:JDDK

Selected Teaching

2020 Pâte de verre masterclass- 36 Lime Street, Newcastle upon Tyne

2019 Cast glass jewellery workshop, Harewood House, Leeds

2017 Casting Masterclass, week long course, National Glass Centre, Sunderland

2017 ’Burnout’ Masterclass, 36 Lime Street, Newcastle upon Tyne

2015 ‘Layered Landscapes’, workshop, National Glass Centre, Sunderland

Selected Publications

‘A Celebration of British Craftsmanship’, Foreword by HRH The Prince of Wales, QEST

‘Coburg Prize for Contemporary Glass’, 2014 and 2022’, catalogues