History of Nigel Hoyle Ceramics

History of Nigel Hoyle, an Art Teacher and Ceramicist living in West Yorkshire, and how he has develped his own brand of ceramics over a period in excess of 20 years.  This is the story, added to annually, recording the direction and ongoing development of his pieces whether they by for Scipelei Pottery Homeware or Exhibition Portfolio Panels and Sculptures.

2020

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2020 began just like any other year, full of enthusiasm, optimism and hope. Exhibitions and shows booked, brimming with new ideas for development. Yet the year began with a dark cloud creeping up in the collective consciousness that has now enveloped everything we do as a society.

It has brought the best and worst.

As an artist I will never be bored or without something to work on: ask my wife and kids! But like many families and lonely people, the longer this period of social distancing continues, the more challenging life will become unless we can adapt to new and simpler routines. After all, our existences are governed by patterns so we have to find new patterns to exist within.

So, I will continue and adapt this creative journey knowing that all the arrangements for events have been cancelled as far as the eye can see. New patterns required!

Stay safe everybody, and one day this will be an important memory consigned to the history books!

2019

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“If it isn’t hand-made, how can I have a favourite?”

This has been a year of consolidation and development. Each time I feel there is time to develop new ideas another show is upon me with a sense of urgency to replenish stock. Now this sounds as though I’m becoming a one man production line in a factory but I cannot see it that way. Each piece thrown on the wheel is an individual work that should be appreciated in its own light. I only ever make 12 mugs in one session, for example. A small body of regular customers continues to grow, who trust that their unique requests can be realised or they can drop in and pick up a gift that cannot be found anywhere in the highways of retail.

Development in the latter half of this year has been the onset of a more sculptural approach to some of my pieces, a truly individual direction, sometimes in collaboration with my talented and wise wife, Susie! This has caused an explosion of ideas and directions that will possible take years to realise in their entirety. In this work I intend to explore a flow of Nature and the beauty that can be found in its detail.

Nature, its spaces occupied and freed across layers of horizon. These themes continue to develop across wall panels that seem to fascinate to eye of the viewer. Relief and multiple textured layers are lost and found among layers of glaze in processes that can only be realised in horizontal surfaces. These panels remain my signature work as a fine artist who pushes the material he is working with to its limits. Failure is such a big part of this process without which we cannot move forward.

2018

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We have been back in the country for two years now and it is hard to believe how far the work has come. In this time I have become an event organiser with www.artatthe.house, and proud to be known as Resident Artist at Cliffe House in Shepley, where I now also work with private students. The work has gone back to its roots somewhat in that it has become more abstract again, yet lots of structure in composition.

During our time in the desert, the nights where we would explore, walking and running, chasing dots, desert foxes, snakes, hares and 46 million years old sharks’ teeth are amongst my fondest memories. The landscape seemed endless in every direction unless we were juxtaposed with the Arabian Sea, homogenised amongst jebels, navigating the hard, rocky limestone seabed that this place once was. Yet this country is one of the smallest in the world – a vulnerable yet powerful and wealthy thumb attached to the kingdom of Saudi Arabia – no bigger than Yorkshire.

I suppose that has been the preoccupation in the making of the series of landscapes I have been working on.

2017

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Images of our time abroad are also beginning to appear across the wall panels, featuring Arabic culture. They also reflect a period of time in the desert, a peaceful, harsh yet beautiful environment, now one of my favourite places to be. The workshop features some of the desert’s works of art that we found and managed to bring home.

This year’s work also reflects our joy of being at home, seeing the local landmarks that will never change no matter how long and far we have travelled.
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2016

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An initial foray into pattern fell away into the setting up of a studio and re-establishing a style without falling back into old habits.

A more subtle focus on landscape has developed in the domestic stoneware towards the end of 2016.

2011

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As we prepared for our move to the Middle East, a series of Triptychs were produced focusing on space and depth using the simple and long established rule of the Golden Section.

More contrast between black and white was punctuated by less colour, a return to earlier priorities with more control of the surface.

2010

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Landscapes were becoming more defined whilst retaining an abstract personality. The introduction of the screen printed image was the bridge between the figurative and the abstract.

Photographic images could now be positioned amongst the layers of texture and become a familiar place within the imagination.

2009

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Having previously thrown every material I knew at the work, more control needed to be exerted in order to refine the surfaces. This helped to create specific conditions and atmospheres.

At this point, rubber latex was used to resist layers of slip in order to reveal areas of contrast, suggesting the illusion of space, an important factor in drawing the viewer to the work.

2008

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The weather and its effect on the landscape has always been a fascination that has driven my work. The raw texture of the moors and valleys have long been carved by nature and its elements in a constant bombardment of the earth’s surface.

I was also searching for ways to increase the scale of the wall work and began to use the idea of the Triptych to use as a larger canvas for landscape.

Prior to 2008

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Work developed significantly after an intense glaze course in 2004, during which a new domestic stoneware glaze was tested and developed using rutile, red iron and cobalt in a satin base glaze.

A new direction was also found in Silicon Carbide which was added to glazes to disrupt surfaces across the wall panels I was making at the time.

Although a little over used at the time, this technique has been ever present in the development of my work ever since.