Birds of Clay Podcast

Rora and Jane finally get the chance to sit down and catch up. 

The beginning of 2025 has been a little rocky and both of our lives seem to be dominated by lots of teaching. So teaching? What role does it play in our practice? What about balance? How do we teach? What do we teach and when do we teach? It's a rambling ride of a chat but hope you get something from it.

If you have feedback, ideas or just feeling like sharing, please reach out. 

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast

Find us on instagram

Rora @aurora_elwell

Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Today we chat with the multi-talented Larissa Warren. We delve into hearing all about her recent commission at HOTA, what it's like being a regional artist, and how she lives a creative life. Larissa also shares her passion for research - examining clay, people and history and speaks about her curation of an upcoming national touring exhibition. We are so grateful for this chat and are taking away some great advice for our own practices!

Check our Larissa's show 'Echos of Place' at Gallery Smith in Prahan, Melbourne until April 19th, 2025. 

Larissa Warren is a ceramicist, curator, writer and art teacher, working from her home studio in an underground bunker on Tamborine Mountain, Queensland. Larissa has gained national recognition through exhibitions and media coverage. She won Ceramic Arts Queensland’s Siliceous Award for Ceramic Excellence in 2018 and HoTA: Home of the Arts in Surfers’ Paradise commissioned a major body of her work for Here and Now: Gold Coast Triennial. She has published in the Queensland History Journal, Pottery Making Illustrated, Australiana and Australian Journal of Ceramics. She is curating an upcoming national touring exhibition with Museums & Galleries Queensland, featuring 12 mid-career ceramic artists who respond to local histories and clays.

ratbagstudios.com

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast

Find us on instagram

Rora @aurora_elwell

Jane @jane.orme.pottery

This episode we're speaking with Ipswich ceramic artist, Isis Reading. Using very few tools other than her hands, Isis creates uniquely figurative functional and sculptural ceramics, thoughtfully finished with an array of hand-made glazes. We discuss how Isis uses her creative practice to support her family, how she maintains a positive outlook and how she has cultivated a creative, slow, love-filled lifestyle. 

If you'd like to follow her work or stay notified on her markets, check out Isis on instagram: @eyes_of_isis_ 

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast

Find us on instagram

Rora @aurora_elwell

Jane @Jane.orme.pottery

Today we chat with Ruby Yeh! We discuss Ruby's experience growing up as Taiwanese Australian and the pressure she has felt around achieving.  We also delve into art prizes, chat about dealing with self doubt, and hear about Ruby's adventures. 

(Sorry for the background noise - it's hard to find a quiet place in the big city!)  

Ruby Yu-Lu Yeh is a Taiwanese-Australian ceramic artist in Meanjin/ Brisbane. She uses wheel-throwing and hand-building techniques to create and develop works that can be sculptural and functional. Ruby’s current exploration focuses on creating vessels with texts as a form of meditation, investigating an internal dialogue between her Eastern upbringing and Western education. Ruby has exhibited in Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney, Japan and Taiwan. She was a finalist in the National Emerging Art Prize (2021 and 2023) and a finalist with a Highly Commended Award in The Siliceous Award for Ceramics Excellence (2023). She won the City of Townsville Art Collection Award in the North Queensland Ceramic Awards (2024). She is also a student of Urasenke Chado (Japanese tea ceremony) under the guidance of Sensei Tomoko (Soho) White. Ruby worked for editor Montessa Maack as the assistant editor for The Journal of Australian Ceramics Vol 63 No 3, November 2024.

Website: https://www.yehceramics.com 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yehceramics/ 

Email: [email protected]

'Raising Kids and Making Pots' article:  https://australianceramics.com/assets/parenting-article-in-full-jac-633.pdf

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Welcome to 2025 and our second season!

In this episode we're having a cuppa and catching up. Chatting about the busy end of 2024, current projects, and goals and expectations of 2025. We have some wonderful interviews coming up that we're very excited for and fingers crossed a wonderful new way to support the podcast through Patreon coming soon.

Thanks for supporting us, we're so excited for this season!

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Welcome to Clay Connections, our short side series.

In this episode we are chatting with the wonderful Holly Macdonald. At the time of recording, Holly was undertaking a residency at the Scottish Sculpture Workshop https://www.ssw.org.uk/.  We chatted about this experience, working with clay through performance, community practice and the ups and downs of living a creative life. A wonderful inspiring chat!

Holly Macdonald is an independent artist working across ceramics, performance, interdisciplinary collaboration and community practice. Through her practice she explores the dynamic relationship between maker, material, and place. By following clay into often unknown sculptural outcomes, Holly aims to foreground material agency and remain open to what we might learn about ourselves and our world from working with such a soft and responsive material.

Currently based in Muloobinba/ Newcastle, Holly has exhibited work throughout Australia including at Maitland Regional Art Gallery, Lake Macquarie's Multi-Arts Pavilion, mima, Cement Fondu, Firstdraft and Sabbia Gallery. They have undertaken residencies in the Northern Territory, France, Belgium and most recently at the Scottish Sculpture Workshop in Scotland. 

As well as maintaining a studio practice, Holly teaches ceramics and has contributed time and enthusiasm to organisations such as The Australian Ceramics Association, The Creator Incubator (Muloobina/ Newcastle) and kil.n.it Experimental Ceramics, Sydney. She is a graduate of the National Art School and holds an Honours degree in Fine Art from RMIT.

https://www.instagram.com/h_ollymacdonald/

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Welcome to Clay Connections, our short side series.

Today we chat with the very talented Samuel Leighton-Dore. Sam is a screenwriter, director and interdisciplinary visual artist based on the Gold Coast, Queensland, living and working on the lands of the Kombumerri families from Yugambeh Language Region.
 
Sam's calmness, warm nature and humour shine through while we chat about vulnerability, toxic masculinity, social media and our struggles with boundaries.

Please check out the below links, especially the smile tiles - they really do make you smile.

https://www.instagram.com/thesmiletiles/
https://www.instagram.com/samleightondore/
https://www.sadmanstudio.com

If you or someone you know is in crisis and needs help now, call triple zero (000). You can also call Lifeline on 13 11 14 — 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

You can also find other supports here https://www.healthdirect.gov.au/mental-health-helplines

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Welcome to Clay Connections, our short side series.

It's our first international chat! Today, Jane is speaking with Eva Masterman from Newcastle, England. 

Eva Masterman is an artist and educator working with clay for over 16 years, in both sculpture and collaborative participation. She is the founder of The Clay Commons, a developing organisation and podcast that explores clay as an agent for change and community studios as sites of emancipatory education and anticapitalist organising.

We chat about the changing face of clay education, the rise of the studio model, creating more inclusive communities and Eva's passion—creating a network of radical community clay studios outside the pressure of capitalism.

@evamasterman

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Welcome to Clay Connections, our short side series.

Today Jane visits Monte Lupo; an amazing clay studio and cafe that provide employment opportunities for artists living with a disability.

https://www.montelupoarts.org.au/
https://www.instagram.com/montelupoarts/

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Welcome to our short side series — Clay Connections!

In a new series of the podcast, we are focusing on wellbeing, community and creativity. We believe in the power of creativity to heal and bring people together.

In this first episode we talk about our own journeys with mental health, when clay becomes work, process vs outcome, imposter syndrome, teaching, community and boundaries.

If you or someone you know is in crisis and needs help now, call triple zero (000). You can also call Lifeline on 13 11 14 — 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

You can also find other supports here https://www.healthdirect.gov.au/mental-health-helplines

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

This week we were joined by Rachel North, an educator and multi-disciplinary artist working on Yuggera Ugarapul Country. Rachel's work explores the complex connections between landscape and memory. Using ceramics, painting and textiles to communicate her conceptual ideas, Rachel tells us how her practice has evolved over time to cross creative disciplines and deepen her understanding of how place can hold and hinder memory.

Rachel tells us about her experiences as an arts educator of the next generation and how she engages her students with the medium of clay. Lastly we ask Rachel how to begin working on a big project, and what's her piece of advice for other makers?

Keep in touch with Rachel and see her latest work here: @maple_and_raven_studio 
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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Today we had the privilege to talk to Nathanlie Marie. Nathanlie (aka Lily) is at the early stages of building a career in clay. It was wonderful to hear her deep passion for the material and be reminded of that obsession we both started with.

Nathanlie Marie is a Filipino artist currently based in Australia. Informed by her lived experience, she works with ceramics and sculpture to investigate the impact of memory on the human experience, as well as the individual and collective identity. Marie investigates the complex emotions brought on by sentimentality towards seemingly mundane objects and situations. Using familiar imagery and objects, combined with her bright and whimsical artistic style, she creates visual narratives which encourage viewers to reflect on their own experiences, through memory and how they perceive the world around them.

We're excited to see what she does next!

@nathanliemarie

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

This episode we chat about our personal glaze journeys, where we are in our glaze educations and where we want to be. We discuss how we use glaze in our creative practices and our introductions into using commercially made glazes and how we began experimenting with raw materials to make our own. 

The best way for us to reach new listeners is through word of mouth so if you like our podcast please let your clay friends know and leave us a rating or review! 

Resources: 

For Flux Sake Podcast 

https://ceramicmaterialsworkshop.com/for-flux-sake-podcast.html

Digital Fire 

https://digitalfire.com 

Glazy 

https://glazy.org 

Learn to Make Glazes For Australian Potters 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/glazes/

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Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Today Jane chats with artist, educator, academic and community worker, David Usher. We chat about David's rich history in the arts in Brisbane and Toowoomba, his research into the 'Spook' and the importance of community.  Please check out David's instagram as it really brings this chat to life with artworks and photos: a real archive of a creative life!
https://www.instagram.com/the_david_usher/

David Usher is a Brisbane born Toowoomba based artist undertaking a Doctorate at the University of Southern Queensland - his area of research is ‘the Spook’. 

David explains, ‘the Spook occurs in an artwork through the culmination of a series of elements - of the application of composition, colour and light... The artist develops an intuitive awareness or knowledge about their arts practice to gain a sense of the overall feeling of the work in front of them, to ascertain whether the composition, or ‘feel’ of the work has reached the moment when it has a kind of magic about it.’ David’s work captures the essence, or emotion within a landscape, and in doing so, embodies the feeling or experience of the Spook. 

There is a wealth of theoretical research David has engaged with, he has recently co-authored an essay titled ‘Notions of the Spook and the Role of the Studio: Considerations of Space and the Sensory Experiences of Producing Art’. 

The thing that is special about this research is that it is a theoretical discussion of something that is felt. The instinctive landscapes are a direct translation of David’s physical experience in a landscape, his experience is captured and transferred to be read as the Spook in his paintings/ceramics. 

David has shown with several galleries including Doggart and ALG, and has work in collections including Queensland Art Gallery, Artbank, Brisbane City Hall Gallery and Queensland Potters Association.
https://www.david-usher.com/

David is represented by Alexandra Lawson Gallery. 
https://www.alexandralawsongallery.com/

David is exhibiting at La Trobe Art Space with Naomi White and Liesl Baker in a show called Tall Tales 11 -17 June. https://www.latrobeartspace.com/

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Have something to add or a question? Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

In the episode today we are reflecting (gushing) about the week we have just had in North West NSW at Clay Gulgong.

Clay Gulgong is a week long biennial event, globally recognised for its strong links with the field of ceramics. It is run by Mansfield Ceramics and brings an amazing group of national and international artists to the beautiful town of Gulgong.
https://www.mansfieldceramics.com/clay-gulgong/about/
@claygulgong_mansfieldceramics

Here are the artists we spoke about:

• Josh Copus @joshcopuspottery  https://www.joshcopus.com/
• Tan Tek Heng (Alvin)  @tucollab
• Naidee Changmoh  @naidee_changmoh
• Chanakarn (Punch) Semachai  @numpucsh https://www.numpucsh.com/
• Shiyuan Xu @shiyuanxu129
• Ted Secombe  @tedsecombeofficial https://tedsecombe.com/
• Malcom Greenwood  @malcomgreenwoodceramics https://malcolmgreenwood.com/
• Tim See @timseeclay
• Ebony Russel @ebonyrussell.art https://ebonyrussell.com/
• Ruth Ju-shih Li @ruth.li.art
• Tomoko Konno @arttomoko https://www.moonxmoon.com/
• Marina Pribaz @marinapribaz https://marinapribaz.com/
• Aaron Scythe @godinc247 https://www.ascythe.com/
• Simone Fraser  @simonefraserceramics  https://simonefraser.com.au/
• Fleur Schell @fleurschell https://www.fleurschell.com/
• Keith Brymer Jones @keithbrymerjones https://www.keithbrymerjones.com/

UniSQ Biennial Art Award
https://www.unisq.edu.au/about-unisq/locations/toowoomba/art-gallery/art-award/2024-finalists

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Have something to add or a question? Talk to us via email [email protected] or DM @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Today Rora and Jane discuss putting their work into the world. When do you do it? Where do you do it?  How do you do it? Deep dives into markets, galleries, art prizes and more. 

Have something to add or a question? Talk to us via email [email protected] or Instagram @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

In this episode we have the privilege to speak to two amazing artists - Shannon Garson & Sarah Rayner! Both women live and work on beautiful Jinibara Country (Maleny and surrounds) in Regional Queensland (in the background you can hear the local birds squawking/chirping and leaves rustling.)

It's a long rich chat. We cover so many great topics - clay origin stories,  working from a home studio, finding your voice, artist statements, importance of community, and the power of critique.
 
Shannon Garson
https://www.instagram.com/shannongarson/
https://www.shannongarsonporcelain.com.au/
Shannon is running the next creative voyage in July in Maleny. Find out more here -https://creativevoyagemaleny.com/

Sarah Rayner
https://www.instagram.com/sarah.rayner/
https://www.sarahrayner.com.au/
Sarah is represented by Gallery Sally Dan-Cuthbert https://gallerysallydancuthbert.com/

Though we better add a glossary for a couple of term we mentioned...
Terra sig - Terra sigillata is a very smooth, lustrous coating of clay which resembles a glaze and is virtually waterproof.
NEIS (New Enterprise Incentive Scheme) - a government funded program supporting new small business owners. It's still happening https://www.dewr.gov.au/new-business-assistance-neis

Today we are at Rora's place and we are taking a deep dive into Kilns! Rora has a Gas Kiln and Jane has an Electric Kiln, we both got them second hand and have had our challenges. We are no experts, just sharing what we have learnt along the way. 

Have something to add or a question? Talk to us via email [email protected] or Instagram @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Our first interview!!!

In this episode we are interviewing the all time great human Peta Berghofer.  We speak about many topics including working with clay, inspiration and design processes, teaching and artist residencies.

Peta Berghofer is an Australian artist based on Giabal and Jarowair lands/Toowoomba, Queensland. Working with clay as her medium and the vessel as her form, Peta creates both ceramic sculptures and functional wares for daily use. Her work references historically familiar form and function, but she disrupts these expectations of traditional vessel-based, ceramic art practices. 

Whether functional or functionless, Peta’s self-referential ceramics are most often presented as the same body of work, exhibited as abstracted still-life installations. Here she plays with distinctions between gallery and domestic spaces, engaging with historic and contemporary tensions between art, craft, and design.

Check out Peta's work below
https://www.petaberghofer.com/
https://www.instagram.com/petaberghofer/

Please reach out if you have any questions or ideas for Birds of Clay. 

You can get in contact with us [email protected] or Instagram @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery

Setting Goals for 2024 - where we're going in 2024, what we want to explore and how to find joy in the things we struggle with (including more reclaim chats - it seems to be an ever-present subject for us both!).

Please reach out if you have any questions or ideas for Birds of Clay. 

You can get in contact with us [email protected] or Instagram @birdsofclay_podcast.

Find us on Instagram
Rora @aurora_elwell
Jane @jane.orme.pottery