The Clare Hall 20th Century Studio Ceramics Research Centre: Bell Collection Symposium
/Clare Hall, a college for advanced study that is part of the University of Cambridge hosted the first symposium of its 20th Century Studio Ceramics Research Centre. The Centre has formed around the bequest of studio pottery to Clare Hall from Associate Professor G. H. Bell and K. M. Bell. The theme of the day was ‘[Bernard] Leach and his Legacy’ - a reflection on the central place of Leach in the Bells’ bequest.
The keynote lecture was delivered by Senior Curator at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Helen Ritchie on the creative and personal relationship between Katharine Pleydell-Bouverie and Norah Braden. The talk was based on a cache of letters that Ritchie had discovered within the Braden family, that she subsequently arranged to be donated to the Crafts Study Centre. The papers give a rich account of the uniqueness of their relationship as two queer women in the inter-war period making pots with their distinctive ash glazes from the pottery they established on Pleydell-Bouverie’s estate, Coleshill.
Talks followed by Professor Nigel Wood on the significant legacy of Cizhou ware on British studio pottery with clear and comprehensive detail on the technical details and how Leach and his circle sought to appropriate the style. In addition, Libby Buckley talked about the exciting new plans for the Leach Pottery in St Ives, including new studio spaces and galleries, Tanya Harrod spoke on Richard Batterham and Helen Walsh from York’s Centre of Ceramic Art talked on Bill Ismay.
My own contribution was an overview of recent research into Leach and his legacy. The review included Professor Simon Olding’s edited volume Discovered Archives published by the CSC in 2020, and the 2020-21 exhibition Kai Althoff Goes with Bernard Leach.
The symposium allowed an opportunity for attendees to see the Bell collection in person. The pots lined up in well-lit vitrines demonstrated a range of ceramic techniques and showed the breadth of Leach’s legacy on 20th century studio pottery.
Highlights included Norah Braden’s modest lidded pot, with a small figurine of an owl and the harvest jug by William Fishley Holland of 1949 which followed in his family tradition of North Devon slipware. The sgraffito design of a farmer and his wife and inscription would have looked right in place in the CSC’s ground floor exhibition Fluidity and Inscription.






