A new exhibition of work by potters John Christie and Maggie Longstaff and painter, Rosemary McLeish is now open at Stirling's Smith Art Gallery and Museum.

John Christie makes wood-fired stoneware and porcelain in Morayshire, Scotland. After studying ceramics at Liverpool College of Art, he ran a small studio pottery in North Wales for fifteen years before returning to his native Scotland where he has been making pots for twenty years.
Many of the pieces in this exhibition are left unglazed on the outside and show the effects of flashing, an accidental effect associated with wood-firing caused by ash landing on the surface of the clay. This is most obvious in the series of pods. These pods are derived from natural form but also have anthropomorphic qualities, resembling entwined human limbs.

Maggie Longstaff makes pictures in clay and her designs are drawn on paper and then transferred to slabs of clay by indentation. The resulting clay imprints are cut up into smaller tiles in sympathy with the overall design. Decoration in relief is applied using coils of clay. Each tile is bisque fired to 1040º, then glazed and fired several times at different temperatures with a range of artistic glazes to achieve rich colourful effects. Her subjects range from portraits and caricatures to flower pieces and larger scale landscapes.

Rosemary McLeish is a painter of flowers in oil pastels. Her subjects are inspired by her love of botanical subjects such as sunflowers and poppies. She is fascinated by the natural world and many of her subjects reflect the human condition which she feels is parallel to the world of plants.

All works in the exhibition are for sale with pots and ceramics starting at £20 and paintings starting at £125.

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