Phil Potter, Kairos Sculpture

Thursday Morning around 11am.

After working on my gap filling of the insulation around my workshop with Chris, one of the college students, it was time to take a wonder around the studios to see who’s around to do another posting on the blog.

My first thoughts were some of the workshops around the outside of the main building, down one of the main corridors, through the double doors to outside. Just up the slope, to the left you can clearly see Phil Potters studio, stone around outside, a temporary covered area for outside working.

Which must be great in the summer months..

 

Phils studio was one of the old out buildings on the site. Used for all sorts...

 

 

 

With lights on, and activity going on inside. Chris and I asked Phil what he was working on, and could we do a bit about him and his work for the blog. I had already pre-warned Phil that he was next on the list, but unsure when. I wanted Chris to firstly make notes, and then try to get a feel for the atmosphere in Phils studio.

The studio was clean and as tidy as you would expext a working studio to be, the roof is covered with plastic sheeting that allows so much light into the space, made even better with the white walls and painted cupboards, very neat.. with a modern feel.

Phil was working on some Portland limestone carvings, smoothing them out ready to be applied to some slate columns. It was a cool relaxed space, partly due to Phil having some Jazz on in the background. The John Law trio, he’d seen them in Birmingham Symphony Hall a couple of weeks ago, and enjoyed them so much he bought the disc, so it was a calm relaxing enviroment, great for your first go at stone carving.

Phil was also working on some plaster casts for slumping some glass over, to make some garden light features. There's always someone working on a piece where it involves another artist/ maker, I'm not certain who's going to be doing the slumping, but if I find out about it, it'll get on here..

 

 

These pieces will be cleaned up and moulds taken from them, to make plaster casts 

 

High on the wall was a picture made up of a violin, an old radio facsia and some frames, this was something that Phil did in the past, and I probably spotted it because it’s the type of thing that I do occasionally. And it does help create an inspiring atmosphere.

 



Up the corner was a carving of a face made in 2004, this piece is really quite big. Phil’s going to revisit it this year, to improve the way it stands and is finished, I’m looking forward to seeing that, it sounds like it will really make the piece stand out.

 



This is Molly, is Phil’s little dog, she's sat on the sofa, just inside the studio

Jumping down every now and then, to have a wonder around.

Time was pressing now, and I wanted to get back to my workshop to get some of the notes together before my time with Chris was over.

So, back to my bench, where we started to write this piece. Chris had done some great notes, he'd remembered such a lot of what Phil had told us. But for this piece I wanted people to get an idea of what the experience would be like, maybe next time with Phil we could delve into the making of a sculpture..

All in all, it went pretty good with Chris, a couple of days later I caught up with Phil, who had Eddie with him. Eddie had the day course with Phil as a birthday present, this is something that is going really well for them, you can purchase vouchers from Phil, to be used later, when it suits you.
 

 

Here's Eddie working on his piece

 

 

and it looks like it's going really well..



 

Sara was there too, Phil's partner, cleaning up the slate sculpted pieces I mentioned earlier, then applying oil to the slate. Looks great, it has to be seen..

and yes, Molly was there too..

 

Next time...

a bit about me

 

All the best

Jamie