1. Where were you born and where are you from ?

I was born in Paris to a French mother and an English father.

2. What is your first memory connected to the art world ?

My mother was a dancer and my father a photographer, so I’ve always lived in a relatively artistic environment. When I started ceramics, I didn’t think of it as art, but more as a hobby. My earliest memories would be at school, when we used to go to museums and I didn’t really understand what art meant. It was much later that I understood that there were forms of art that could provoke emotion just by their beauty or by what they could evoke in our personal lives.

3. Have you always worked in the art/design field ?

No, before that I studied History and worked in the restaurant business (sommellerie and cooking). I wouldn’t say it’s an art form, but it is a form of beauty. Food, what you do with it.

4. What led you to the design creation ?

When I was about twenty-two, I started working with clay again. I’d been doing a bit of it all my life, but it just became more and more present. I started looking at things that inspired me and then, little by little, I detached myself from those things to create my own identity. I don’t know if I have a design approach, but I like the simplicity of objects. In any case, that’s what I know how to do. 

5. How would you describe your creative process and it influences ?

I like the sobriety of the pieces. I always work from research of shapes that I draw, and then it’s mainly in 3D that the shape comes. The process is really one of researching shapes, a little drawing of what I want to do and then it’s really on the first vase that it really starts to take shape. At that point, I do more and more studies before ending up with the final shape. My influences are very broad, and can be architecture, other ceramists or photography. I like to look at interiors from the 70s, for example, where in fact there are vases that aren’t necessarily signed or designer shapes, but which are quite notable in interiors.

6. Could you describe a typical day of your work ?

I’m very regulated because I have my children, so I really have a fairly classic working day. I start at 9.30am and finish at 6pm. There’s either creation, so really production, or all the post-production, so that means sanding, glazing, enamels. All the research into shapes is done outside these working hours, when I’m on my own, before going to bed, because that’s a part I like to do quietly.

7. Why did you choose the specific materials you work with ?

Because I’ve been making ceramics since I was little. I wanted to do ceramics again, rather than art in the first place.  I’ve tried other mediums, but they don’t suit me. I love the elasticity of stoneware and the possibilities it offers.

8. What are the technical particularities of your creations ?

I only do pellet modeling, so I don’t use lathes or molds. Everything is done by hand.

9. What advices could you give to beginning artists who would like to create sculptural design works ?

Be inspired without copying. Find your own style, even if it’s complicated and time-consuming. Hang in there, because it’s not easy at first. You can never speed up time; years of experience need to exist. You have to persevere and believe in yourself and your abilities. 

10. If your works had to belong to a design movement, in which one would you define it ?

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11. What designers and artists have influenced you ?

I love artists who do very simple things, so they’re quite similar to what I do. I love Brancusi, Zadkine, the ceramist Lucie Rie.

12. What contemporary designers do you appreciate ?

Ronan Bouroullec

13. What contemporary artists (in any kind of art) have you been inspired by ?

There are paintings I love, which aren’t necessarily simple and have nothing to do with anything, but which will move me, for example Alice Neel.

14. If you had to summarize your creations in one word or sentence, what would it be ?

“The search for perfect imperfection”. What I like about my work is the uniqueness of my pieces. Given that it’s not a lathe, my aim is not to have something with absolute symmetries, and above all, I don’t want to reproduce pieces indefinitely that are exactly the same. What interests me is that you can see that it’s handmade, but that it’s still as perfect as possible. All the while keeping the trace of the hand.

Proust Questionnaire with very short answers (one or a few words) :
(The Proust Questionnaire is a set of questions answered by the French writer Marcel Proust. Other historical figures who have answered confession albums are Oscar Wilde, Karl Marx, Arthur Conan Doyle, Stéphane Mallarmé, Paul Cézanne…)