Q&A with Alison Coaten
Alison Coaten’s sculptural ceramics are inspired by the Medieval and Renaissance periods and influenced by objects of worship from myth, folklore and religion. She is one of my most renowned artists, and her works remind me of a Philip Pullman novel, reminiscent of characters from distant lands. I was intrigued to find out more about Alison’s creations, her processes and the woman herself. Here’s what we discovered.
How and when did you first come into contact with clay?
I was first introduced to clay by a parent volunteer at primary school. I must have been around 8 or 9 at the time, and this had a big impact on me. I loved it. When my son was at primary school, I went in every Christmas to make clay figures with all the children. I would bring their work home to fire and have miniature Gormley like ‘Fields’ in my workshop.
At secondary school, we had a good ceramic department and an enthusiastic art teacher who really encouraged my love of hand building. I can remember the first time a large piece exploded in the kiln and how he dreaded telling me, but it’s a harsh lesson ceramicists go through.
How would you describe your creative practice?
I collect images that I come across in museums, churches, books and online, often from stained glass windows, religious artefacts and paintings. Influences and characters that circulate, changing form and meaning, before coming to the surface months or even years later, asking to be made. For some pieces, I will make sketches or maquettes, while other times I just start making, which seems spontaneous at the time, but on reflection, these pieces have evolved subconsciously.
I hand build my figures using a mixture of clays, combining coiling and slab building to create hollow forms which I cut, assemble and manipulate from within. The basic structures are built using two grogged clays; a red and a white body which I use for their strength and texture and then I sculpt and carve using other clays to create further depths of colour.
The eyes that I use are made from blown glass, a material that has undergone a similar transformation like that of clay to ceramic, so I feel the two are connected. It’s important to me that the eyes are not ceramic or painted with glazes because using a different material, a readymade, removes me from the final step and creates an otherness that I have limited control over.
Describe your studio. Do you listen to anything while you are creating?
My workshop is located in my garden, which most of the time is a blessing, but working from home can be distracting at times. I enjoy listening to audiobooks and podcasts. Recently I’ve been binge listening to podcasts on nutrition and medicine. I find biology fascinating and old anatomy models often filter through into my work.
I find your inspiration for making artwork very interesting, namely your fascination with the human desire to make sense of existence through religion, myth and folklore. Can you tell us more about this?
Religion exists in all cultures and has been around for hundreds of thousands of years, from hunter-gatherers involved with shamanic style trances and spirit worlds to the relatively recent theology based religions. I’m interested in how religions have evolved and the common myths and imagery they hold, images we have grown up with so most of us can find a connection to it in one form or another, be it human or animal.
I used to find the terms’ religious’ and ‘spiritual’ problematic, and I still shy away from using the latter. Yet, when you look at them in evolutionary terms, they can be fascinating. Religion and spirituality are by-products of how our brains work. We evolved to see and to believe in things that weren’t there. We created myths to try and make sense of life, as well as to bind us together socially. As humans, we have the cognitive tendency to see everything as having intentional design. Research suggests that we are primed to see signs; that strange sounds or objects could be potential predators and evolution taught us to pay attention.
Your muses appear otherworldly or from far lands. Can you tell us more about these characters?
My figures often come from historical paintings, particularly from the Renaissance period; characters sometimes found within a larger scene, others directly influenced such as the Madonna and child pieces.
How important to you is originality in artwork?
I don’t think anything is truly original. We are visual creatures, constantly influenced by our surroundings, whether we are conscious of it or not. My work relies on this; I want people to think they have seen it before and have an immediate or underlying connection. I want them to be curious as to what is familiar and what is slightly disconcerting.
When I first came into contact with your work, you were using white clay to form your sculptures. Since then, you have introduced red clay into your pieces. Can you tell us more about how and why this change came about?
I still use a single white body and glaze for some of my work, especially the highly narrative or detailed pieces, I like the simplicity and calm of this style as it draws attention to the minimal use of lustre or emphasises the connection with the eyes.
As my technique and confidence has grown, I have wanted to explore the clay body itself and the surfaces and textures I could create with it, which has led to a freer and more experimental style. Rather than a figure trapped within a skin of glaze, I’m enjoying exposing the ‘flesh’ beneath using the red clays visceral qualities, though that sounds a little more gruesome than is intended!
What do you want people to feel when they see your work?
I want them to feel a presence. People talk about a piece of art that ‘talks’ to them, that they connect with. For me, my most successful pieces offer familiarity and comfort, tinged with unease. Characters that they want to take into their homes and live with, but maybe keep an eye on.
Your work doesn’t shy away from notions of death and the macabre. Can you tell us more about those aspects of your practice?
I studied Fine Art sculpture for my degree, and my work became centred around the notion of morbid fascination, taboo and transgression. The ambivalence of taboo often establishes our relationship with the sacred. On the one hand, the sacred is seen as a positive power, something that brings a blessing when we are in contact with it. On the other hand, the sacred is seen as a negative power, comprising restrictions to man, something which causes death or ill fortune when we meet with it. It was here that I first became aware of cognitive dissonance and how art can evoke this conflict of feelings.