Neil Brownsword’s work over the past dozen years has drawn intensely from his surroundings in Stoke on Trent. Growing up here, against the background of the decline of the Potteries and the subsequent demolition of many of the original factory sites – he has found a rich source of inspiration and material in the detritus and clay waste that lies beneath the city.

By collecting and re-using these various scraps, the fusings and meltings he has found from the factory floor, and assembling them into beautiful abstract amalgams – often further transformed by re-firing – Brownsword regenerates this material into structures and landscapes with various levels of meaning. The work comments on and explores the history and social experience of working in the city’s pottery industry.

Above: Neil Brownsword, Stoke-on-Trent, 2008
Photo © Steve Speller, courtesy of the Crafts Council