Janet DeBoos, Head Teacher of Ceramics at the Canberra Art School, ANU, has been a potter for many years, working with stoneware and porcelain. Her current exhibition brings out the unique qualities of porcelain: whiteness, fineness, translucency and strength. She is interested in making objects for everyday use – vases, serving dishes, cups and teapots. Yet these pieces extend the concept of use, taking the experience of using into another realm: her multiple sets of vases, her teasets and cup collections add up to more than just the single objects on their own. DeBoos is committed to the art of throwing, taking this special potters’ technique to an extraordinary refinement.

Patsy Hely is a teacher in the ceramics department at Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW. She is well known as a leader in a ceramics movement making work away from the mainstream. Taking domestic objects – teacups, teapots, pouring vessels and dishes – she makes us look at our use of these objects anew. Nostalgia and the avant-garde both play a part in her work, she takes found objects and combines them with her own cast ceramic pieces to make groupings that evoke the history of ceramics and contemporary life. Her work can be seen in a continuum; they are part of her continuing project to make work that is of relevance to her as a person and an artist.