Featured Artist

It is a hot summer morning, and I am heading to interview Josh Nathanson, a ceramicist from Cape Town in South Africa who now lives near Stanfordville, NY. Josh and his husband Brett ran Gallery and Goods in Pine Plains, NY, for several years as an outlet for local artists, including themselves, to show their work. Within his practice Nathanson often utilizes locally grown plant material for his ceramic pieces in the summer months, so I am curious to see what is currently on his shelves. 

JN: Since childhood, I’ve been engaged with ceramics, starting when I was seven or eight. My mother signed me up for a neighborhood class in the pottery studio in Cape Town, South Africa. It was not a children’s class but an everybody’s class. As a result, even as an eight-year-old, I was treated with equal creative respect, which was so fortunate. I felt free in the class.There was no insistence on working a certain way; instead, there were infinite ways of building, finishing, and firing work. This experience started me on a journey of exploration. I grew up in South Africa with the tribal arts filled with textures based on solid color contrasts, which have influenced my work. My parents moved us to the States, and ultimately, I became immersed in NYC, working in real estate. However, I continued my ceramic practice at the Supermud studio in the neighborhood. This access kept me engrossed. It was both a social and practical process, and I loved engaging weekly with fellow artists. Sometimes, the pottery process was less paramount than just being part of the group. 

Describe your studio life

When my husband, Brett, and I found this house, he rebuilt the original studio for his art practice. He now has his studio in Pine Plains. As such, I inherited this incredible space and opportunity to set up the studio to experiment and work full-time as a ceramicist far away from the real estate world. Typically, I am here daily. I work with a large slab roller. This mechanical device creates consistent and even slabs of clay from the outstanding Bailey’s Ceramic Supply in Kingston, which gives me this incredible base material to work on, imprinting both place and memory into the clay. 

Why do you prefer to work with a slab versus a wheel?

Firstly, wheelwork only worked for me if I was in a perfectly calm state. That was rare, so this approach allows me to be loose and flexible. I prefer the look and feel of the wabi-sabi inconsistency and the endless shape possibilities. The process is as important as the outcome; it is essential. 

I’m also interested in the process within my practice. It’s different, but it is the journey from the beginning, whether getting a stretcher ready or a lump of clay, and the tactile aspect of touch and feel – that physical memory to the brain – making and thinking. 

Yes! And the beauty for me, in my practice, is that unless I’m making a commission for someone, I don’t typically have a result in mind. I’m often open to what happens. 

To chance?

To chance and a lot of experimentation. My practice focuses on texture transfer. I select botanicals or fabrics with dimensionality. However, I usually don’t know how the piece will finish because pressing items into the clay only sometimes translates to how you expect it to. Objects that are unattractive in real life become attractive in the clay when their literal form transfers. Interestingly, the form of an object changes with the inverse print. 

My materials employed in texture transfer are seasonally based; currently, I use more growing plant material as opposed to dried plants, which I do more in winter. When nothing grows in nature, I shift to found objects and fabrics, so much is determined by availability and chance. When my husband Brett and I are hiking with the dog, he gently teases me as I constantly say, “What would that look like in clay?” Or “There’s a leaf shape I have yet to try.” I am a creature of habit. For decades, I have worked with white stoneware as a clay body. There are about 50 or 60 option that are all slightly different, with varied coloring, texture, grit, and elements that affect the composition. This Tucker’s clay is also a white stoneware with a porcelain element, yet it is still stoneware, so it’s much easier to work with. It grabs impressions in a particular way, a perfect mimicry, getting every little fiber and hair.

When plant seeds get stuck in the clay, do they stay, or do you have to remove them?

Some organic material stays there, which is a trade-off because it leaves an evident burn mark, which can be interesting. After all these years of doing this, I’m constantly advancing my craft with technical stuff. I’m part of a Facebook ceramic cohort where we swap technical advice. It’s a wonderful community. It feels like an incredible privilege to have this experience, and thankfully, the learning curve hasn’t plateaued.  

This practice typically involves hand-shaping things. Vase making is the most challenging. It’s a matter of finding the right level of clay stiffness, often through trial and error. The timing varies dramatically based on the time of year and climate, so I’m constantly experimenting. However, I still struggle with impatience, most evident when waiting for the kiln to cool down, as one can only open the lid below a specific temperature. Even after all these years, I’m excited to see how things turn out. I greatly respect Japanese wood-burning, long-standing kilns because there’s so much less control in that process, and it requires immense control. I feel so fortunate to live in a digital thermometer era with a more reliable outcome, whereas years ago, it was all physics; the cone had to melt, etc. When I bought the kiln, it felt like a jump into the unknown, previously I had experienced the luxury of being part of a studio, where I just put something on a shelf for firing. I am now okay with results that don’t match my expectations; however, it was a hard lesson to learn early on.

Which ceramicists inspire you?

Edmund De Waal’s aesthetic is fantastic. I also appreciate that he is not narrowly siloed. 

Yes, I love his recent works, larger-than-life black vessels.

I have benefited from my own journey of exploration, stepping away from more traditional techniques like full-color and symmetrical wheel-based objects, which is the proper way to make things. So, I’ve experimented with the whole idea of technique and have returned to my old Studio Super MUD in the city to give texture presentations to students. I also bring pieces of bisque pottery with which I can explain the glazing techniques I use and allow people to learn from a place of experiment. Last summer, my friend Kate Farrar, who owns Foxtrot Flowers, a local flower farm, presented a workshop where people picked the flower fields and created a range of tiles from what they had found at Foxtrot. Learning from the students during the teaching process is a joy, which positively impacts my work.

Nathanson imprints so much of life and external place into the clay, showing me a mold made from a fallen tree’s stump outside the Studio. Working with wood grains, imagining this or that texture, he sourced a vinyl snakeskin at a favorite store, another mold. Even the rubber mat on the floor is now employed after rolling out a slab that accidentally fell on it. He loved the mark-making imprint, like tiny rocks, so that became one of the textures, constantly documenting these unique fingerprints as a permanent memory. “Recently, I pulled out this little root form from the garden, which will leave a unique imprint. It compares to the brain and nervous system and how that mimics plant roots, bringing a symbiotic relationship with place into the work.”

You sometimes refer to your grandmother and you incorporate many of her pieces into your work. Is that to retain the tender relationship you had with her through your practice? Or is it because she had beautiful objects that you wanted to imprint?

After we moved to the USA, my brother and I still spent summers with our grandparents in South Africa. We had a consistent relationship with my maternal grandmother while living so far away. She was an interesting person who had an almost Victorian upbringing, with an item for everything. She owned many unique wedding gifts from the 1930s and carefully stored them in bags wrapped in tissue paper when not in use.

I received a commission from a newly married couple who wanted their wedding dress imprinted into the clay and memorialized as a platter. This early commission sparked the idea of using fabrics and materials in my work. Years ago I had carefully hidden the whole collection of my grandmother’s linens, vintage clothing, and lace deep in one of my closets. Among these precious materials was a crocheted lace place setting that was part of her wedding gift set. The first time I took it out of the tissue paper and brought it into the studio, it felt weird, and I questioned whether it was sacrilege to use objects that had been so cared for. They had not been touched in decades but were crying out for recognition. This project began the connection between time, memory, and the moment.

These connections to the fabric have sparked work and gifts from people who have lost an older relative. They ask if I can do a work about someone or use objects for work, and I love that. Also, the mundane onion bags and fishing nets translate very well, so I broadly categorize the materials I use into botanicals, fabrics, and found objects. Most of my pieces are one-of-a-kind creations. I’m happy when work goes into the world because I know it will have a purpose. A friend attended a dinner party in Boston, and someone had gifted the host a piece of my pottery. I love that level of connection through my work.

Your hand has traveled far! These objects you have made are conscious. People find a connection to a unique bowl or plate that has not been mass-produced.

I sense that as we progress towards this unknown future that’s more automated with AI, people will return to using their hands for a deeper connection and a pushback to AI. People will want to make things. Somebody could easily replicate my work, but people still want the original object, and some of my pieces have my fingerprints; each is handmade. 

Do you have a time of day that you prefer to work?

I have the incredible privilege of having the studio next to the house, down the garden path, so I’m in and out all day. In the NYC studio, I created the work, covered the clay in plastic, and then would return a week later to whatever level the clay was. Now, the beauty of what I do here is that I can define the optimal moment to work on the clay, based on its stiffness. The weather and elements are relatable, so I come out, touch something, and know it needs an hour or two more to firm up. If you asked my friends in the NYC studio, they would confirm I would have been the least likely professional ceramicist! But I have been working professionally for ten years, and the great joy is the lack of expectations for myself. I love doing it, and it’s fantastic that people respect what I’m making, but that’s not the driving motivation; it’s just doing the work, which also sends the message: if you find something you love, don’t stop doing it. That is a critical point in Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers book, which discusses 10,000 hours spent on a subject, sport, or interest to build knowledge and skill. You must start with the passion to switch through the hard part to learn and explore.

What kind of commissions do you make?

I am always cautious with commissions because they are exploratory practices. I often warn people when commissioned that I’m still determining how it will turn out. There are a range of variables, but this does not deter anyone. Some work comes from memory-based items like wedding dresses or an item that belonged to grandparents, which is a recurring request. I recently had a commission request from someone who had previously bought an early piece made with a ubiquitous weed that grows here, the garlic mustard plant, with a heart-shaped leaf. They loved it and wanted to collect more pieces using that plant. In the Hudson Valley, the growing season is so quick, and the windows of opportunity for certain plants are incredibly short, but the seed heads are interesting; now, the poppy seed heads are setting. So, living in the moment is critical to my practice. Photographing the work brings an archival reference point and a calendar aspect to life in the studio.

What was the best advice you were given regarding your practice?

That’s a good question. Firstly, all the invaluable technical advice. Secondly, Brett, who is also an artist, told me to go with it, do the work, not have a pre-expectation about the result, and be open to something, even if it was not the intention. Especially in the beginning, I would make a work where I had a specific idea of the result, but when opening the kiln, it would be completely different, and I felt disappointed. Now, I try  just to allow it to be what it is and approach it with fresh eyes. It goes back to being patient and not over-tinkering with the work, which took a long time for me to learn, as clay has memory. I am still learning the importance of allowing the surface to fully harden before touching it. The pottery practice positively impacted my disposition, encouraging me to slow down and see the world with fresh eyes every day. 

Nathanson’s work is tactile and inviting to the touch. One wants to interact with it and understand the texture, which comes from natural clay – it’s from the earth. Striking colors slip in while other pieces are untouched. The studio faces directly into the garden, and his inspiration is often directly through the glass. The packed shelves are ladened with various projects in process, some with embedded plant material, others awaiting glazing and firing. n the back are boxes filled with fabrics and textiles awaiting their moment. •

To find more of Josh Nathanson’s work, go to his website jrnpottery.com or his Instagram: @jrnpottery. You can also find him at the Millerton Farmers Market or email him at josh@towngrange.com.