Tiles - Stephen Earp

As It Was In The Beginning
Apocalyptic allusions of biblical proportion aren’t ideal introductions to pottery history during, say, a pandemic. This whirlwind discussion instead reminisces on some more charitable – if highly condensed – aspects of human interaction. We begin with the “crooked but interesting” Egyptian Fatamid Caliphate and a curious phenomenon accompanying, even propelling, the diffusion of ceramic traditions […]
Let It Be
“European ceramics were forever indebted to superior Chinese efforts, once exposed to those wonders.” This nugget of received wisdom, initiated by a continent-wide, 200 year long porcelain recipe hunt, permeates the study of European ceramics from roughly the 16th century onward. That perspective even percolated down to the Fine Arts studio ceramics narrative after Bernard […]