All posts by Fired Up Elf!

Guest Artists

Guest Artists 2023

Ayal Heinrichs

Ayal grew up on the west coast of BC, and her pottery is influenced by her love for the outdoors and a desire to make beautiful objects for daily routines. In 2020 she moved to Nelson where she completed a Certificate in Ceramics and apprenticed with local artists. She is currently pursuing a BFA at the University of Regina.

           Ellen Statz

Ellen was born and raised in the small coastal community of Campbell River. As the daughter of a commercial fisherman, she has a long and direct connection with the sea and with nature.

Sarah Leckie

Sarah is a ceramic artist living on Vancouver Island. She loves clay and designing pieces that tell stories. Each of her cups is thrown from porcelain on the wheel, and hand-painted with black slip. The fine line details of the characters and creatures are made by carving through the black to the porcelain underneath. While Sarah repeats many of her characters, each piece is individually painted and is unique. She is curious to know what is even going on for each of these characters that come from her brush

 

Show News

Fired Up! 2023

Fired Up! 2023,  Smoke & Fire. 

May 27th and 28th, 2023 from 10 am – 5 pm.

A collaboration of crafted design and the effects of wood and smoke firing will be on display this year at Fired Up! Members are embarking on a four day firing at Gordon Hutchens’ Denman Island Pottery to bring you their latest creations caressed by the flames of the firing.  We look forward to seeing everyone again this May.

Features

Exhibition booths: 9 core members of Fired Up! plus 3 guest artist.

Vin Arora, Alan Burgess, Samantha Dickie, Sandra Dolph,  Sandy Harquail, Gordon Hutchens, Cathi Jefferson, Meira Mathison, and Kinichi Shigeno.  This years guest artists are Ayal Heinrichs, Sarah Leckie, and Ellen Statz.

Our annual show is a much-anticipated tradition eagerly awaited for by Ceramic enthusiasts and collectors. It is held on the last weekend of May, yearly, at Metchosin Hall, on the outskirts of Victoria.

Metchosin Community Hall
4401 William Head Rd
Metchosin, BC V9C 3Y6
Phone: 250-590-5744

Samantha Dickie working in her studio in Victoria.Over the past 37 years, there have been a total of 23 members of the Fired Up! group. The current core group consists of people who continue to produce and exhibit exciting and innovative work.

Our Core Members

Artist Profile

Sandy Harquail

​​Throughout my life I have been fascinated by the design process. My experiences as a child making tree forts, dress-up costumes and mud pies, in many ways influences how I pursue ceramics today. I use clay like a seamstress uses fabric, cutting patterns with curves and darts to change the shape and form. I envision my pots as pieces of architecture, always striving to create stable structures out of the pliable material all the while finding a balance in function and form. Each time as the clay is transformed from lifeless slabs to volumetric forms there is an excitement, a breath, an inhalation that I find nowhere else. 

​I began my exploration of ceramics in high school in small town St. Clair, Michigan in an independent study program. Through this program I discovered a love of clay that led me to pursue the arts at Eastern Michigan University. Looking back at my youth I see the influences of creative people all around me. My father, a finish carpenter, is a precision craftsman. My grandmother created slip cast porcelain wares and dolls. My Mother was always pursuing one craft project after the other. It was inevitable that I would become a maker of some kind.

http://www.sandyharquail.com/

Artist Profile

Vin Arora

Vin Arora

Vin Arora
Vin Arora

A closer look at Vin’s artwork will reveal that it contains the spirit of an urban environ yet is fused with a profound respect for nature and the logic and mystery in materials. Any single work could reflect various energies like that of a folk festival, a hip-hop show, drag pageant, cartoon realities, dreamscapes, a political rally, or a silent retreat. His work derives colour, shape and texture from walks in the downtown east side as much as it does from contemplative hikes into the forest with his dog.

Vin Arora is a Vancouver based artist working and teaching in ceramics, exploring material as means of social cohesion and community building as well as a means of inward reflection. Vin attended the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design (Now ECU) starting in ’96 and has worked in clay in Vancouver ever since. Vin has worked with many great teachers, artists and potters in Vancouver and also takes influence from travels in India and Britain.

Techtonic Plate Series-Stoneware-2″x 11″x9″-2017

www.techtonicplates.net

Vin Arora  vinarora6@gmail.com