Transference

TRANSFERENCE
ROBYN CAMPBELL | JO VICTORIA
Craft ACT Craft + Design Centre

Craft ACT: Craft + Design Centre is supported by the
ACT Government, the Visual Arts and Craft Strategy –
an initiative of the Australian State and Territory
Governments, and the Australia Council for the Arts – the
Australian Government’s arts funding and advisory body.
CRAFT ACT CRAFT + DESIGN CENTRE
Tues–Fri 10am–5pm
Saturdays 12–4pm
Level 1, North Building, 180 London Circuit,
Canberra ACT Australia
+61 2 6262 9333
www.craftact.org.au
Cover: Robyn Campbell, Echo (detail), 2020, porcelain and
glass. Photo: Courtesy of the artist. Full image on page
12-13.
Page 4-5: Jo Victoria, Ocean #3, 2020.Photo: Brenton
McGeachie

TRANSFERENCE
ROBYN CAMPBELL | JO VICTORIA
Craft ACT Craft + Design Centre
14 May - 27 June 2020
3

4

5

6

Transference
Exhibition statement
Transference is a collaborative exhibition by
artists Robyn Campbell (ACT) and Jo Victoria
(NSW) who exchanged their knowledge of
glass and porcelain through a supportive
process of learning, teaching, experimentation
and play. The exhibition expresses the artists’
shared fascination with light and surface, and
the potential of glass and porcelain to convey
fragility and transience.
Although working with different mediums, the
artists took inspiration from the natural world
and their surrounding landscape: Campbell
from Canberra’s surrounding natural beauty
and Victoria from the coastal landscape of
Mossy Point on the south coast of NSW. Both
artists felt safely supported by the collaborative
process which emboldened them to explore new
techniques and new work.
“The collaborative opportunity to share skills
and material knowledge with glass artist, Robyn
Campbell has been a luxurious and stimulating
creative process that has extended both our
practices beyond what we could have achieved
individually. Our love of the purity of glass and
porcelain and their respective interactions with
light has been the platform to push our art
practices to new and exciting possibilities,” said
ceramic artist Jo Victoria.
Opposite: Robyn Campbell, Lilt, 2020, slip cast
and handbuilt porcelain, fused glass. Photo:
courtesy of the artist.
Page 8: Robyn Campbell, Pool, 2020,fused and
cast glass, hand built porcelain. Photo: courtesy
of the artist.
Page 11: Jo Victoria, Ocean #1, 2020. Photo:
Brenton McGeachie
7

8

Exhibition essay
Catalogue essay: Dr Julie Bartholomew
Integrating glass and porcelain is a
passionate focus of my art practice, so
writing about two artists who are exploring
these exquisite materials, each requiring
challenging processes of making, is an
exciting task. However, discussing art
objects that I have not experienced in ‘real’
life and time is unfamiliar, although 2020
is a year for unparalleled experiences.
The art world must move forward
by expanding its virtual engagement
so artists, writers, galleries and their
audiences remain connected, enabling
forms of physical distancing to reboot our
lives. Fortunately, I have walked around,
touched and engaged with Jo Victoria
and Robyn Campbell’s earlier work during
exhibitions and studio visits. Memories
of haptic body and object interactions -
gliding fingers across clay surfaces and
soaking up the three dimensionalities of
an object whilst sharing the same space -
seem more crucial now than ever before.
The exhibition titled Transference - the
action of transferring something -
encapsulates Victoria and Campbell’s
shared enthusiasm for light in action. Both
artists engage with porcelain and glass
forms to activate reflections, shadows,
glints, shimmers, flickers and transience.
Within bodies of porcelain, light animates
a soft white translucency, and in bodies of
kiln cast and slumped glass, light radiates
a crystal-like transparency.
As demonstrated by the artists’ earlier
work, form is realised in very distinct
ways. Victoria deconstructs the solidity
of form by allowing light to pierce
through fragmented or perforated slip
cast segments and organic burn-outs. 1
Campbell reinforces shape and form by
attaining a continuity of surface across
planes of porcelain, glass and enclosed
structures. For Campbell, this approach
encourages reflected light to transit
smoothly and quietly across open vessels
and enclosed objects that are nestled
within.
Sharing an enthusiasm for the natural
environment, Victoria’s porcelain forms
echo the fragility of disintegrating organic
matter or fractured shells found at the
edge of oceans. Reflective high gloss
glazes and aquamarine kiln slumped
glass capture the transitory and fleeting
ocean light that is so fundamental to her
practice.
9

Campbell’s glass and porcelain pieces
reconfigure patterns and shapes
experienced during nature walks,
as essential and simple material
manifestations. The interplay between
open and enclosed organic forms,
intensified by fleeting light and shadow,
transmits a visual narrative that speaks to
protection, shelter, containment, calmness
and tranquillity. Pool and Echo in particular
visualises the interrelated natural world in
a refined and sensuous manner.
the fragility of porcelain and glass forms
to advocate for the transcendence of
seascapes. Transference is the end result
of a collaborative narrative between the
artists that encapsulates a passion for
porcelain, glass, light and the natural world
that they occupy.
Dr Julie Bartholomew
Ceramic artist and educator
Transference is an exhibition that
foregrounds the capacity of light to
activate inanimate clay and glass forms
and suggests the beauty and transience
of the natural world. This show presents
a collection of stunning pieces and given
the opportunity, audiences would marvel
at their beauty, strength, vulnerability
and obvious dedication to craftmanship.
On the other hand, Transference may
also allude to the act of sharing material
knowledge, skills and different responses
to the world of nature. Trained as a glass
artist, Robyn Campbell suggests the quiet
beauty of landscapes with the interplay
of light and relational porcelain and glass
forms. Trained as a ceramics artist, Jo
Victoria captures and reflects light through
10
[1] The ceramic process of burning out organic
material coated with porcelain casting slip.

11

12

13

Robyn Campbell
Artist statement
‘Transference’ is the result of a
collaboration in learning, teaching,
experimentation and play between jo
Victoria and myself.
Jo and I share a fascination with light and
surface and the potential of glass and
porcelain to convey a sense of fragility, the
transient and the ephemeral.
Biography
Robyn Campbell is a Canberra-based
artist who uses ceramics and glass
within her practice. Since Graduating
from the Australian National University
Glass Workshop in 1993, Campbell has
exhibited nationally and internationally,
and has received various awards and
commissions.
In my art practice I’m interested in form
and the spaces and relationships between
forms, often with a sense of enclosure,
containment and protection. I strive to
achieve simplicity, calm and beauty in my
sculptural pieces. In this new work the
intangible elements of light, shadow and
reflection are significant, changing the
pieces as natural light and perspective
shift.
My inspirations continue to be the natural
world and landscape.
Jo’s encouragement over the past months
helped me push forward with new work
and new techniques. I see the final pieces
for ‘Transference’ are a stepping off point
for evolving a fresh body of work using
porcelain and glass.
Page 12-13: Robyn Campbell, Echo, 2020. Photo:
Courtesy of the artist.
Opposite: Robyn Campbell, Alight #2, 2020. Photo:
Courtesy of the artist.
Page 16: Jo Victoria, Ocean #15, 2020. Photo:
Brenton McGeachie
15

16

Jo Victoria
Artist Statement
‘My art practice explores ideas of
place and focuses on the influence
of living close to the ocean. Unglazed
porcelain captures an essential quality
of this experience. The whiteness and
translucency of this material produces
similar qualities to bleached bones, fossils
and broken shells found on the beaches
and rock platforms on the ocean’s edge.
Porcelain sculptural works feel fossil like in
the way that they capture the life essence
of once living things in this environment.
I use light in my work to portray a
sense of ephemerality. The way light
interacts with the materiality of porcelain
enhances ideas of fragility, strength and
the influences of deep time. I have also
developed a series of glassy glazes that
create a sense of watery ocean light in the
works. A natural extension of my practice
is to introduce glass as a material that
references and deepens the experience
of these ideas. In these new works I
aimed to mix porcelain and glass to bring
another dimension to my work where
light transfers, intersects and interrupts
relationships between the forms to create
an immersive experience to the exhibition.
The collaborative opportunity to share
skills and material knowledge with
glass artist, Robyn Campbell has been a
luxurious and stimulating creative process
that has extended both our practices
beyond what individual solo shows could
have achieved. Our love of the purity of
glass and porcelain and their respective
interactions with light have been the
platform to push our art practices to new
and exciting possibilities.
Biography
Jo Victoria is a ceramic artist who
specialises in porcelain and is based in
Mossy Point, NSW. Victoria initially worked
as an anthropologist and archaeologist for
many years before studying ceramics at
the Australian National University School
of Art. Since graduating in 2016, Victoria
has created work referencing fossils and
exploring stories of place.
17

18

22

List of works
Robyn Campbell
1 Echo, 2020
slip cast and handbuilt porcelain,
fused glass
$800
6 Alight #3, 2020
hand built porcelain
$380
2 Lilt, 2020
slip cast and handbuilt
porcelain, fused glass
$400
7 Alight #1, 2020
slip cast and handbuilt
porcelain
NFS
3 Pool, 2020
fused and cast glass, hand
built porcelain
$800
8 Peal, 2020
slip cast and handbuilt
porcelain
$420
4 Blaze, 2020
slumped and cast glass, cut
and polished
$400
5 Alight #2, 2020
hand built porcelain
$350
26

List of works
Jo Victoria
1 Ocean #1, 2020
slip cast and handbuilt
slumped glass, slip cast
and carved porcelain,
constructed porcelain
$580
6 Ocean #6, 2020
slumped glass, constructed
porcelain, slipcast porcelain
$380
2 Ocean #2, 2020
lumped glass, slip cast
porcelain
$390
7 Ocean #7, 2020
slumped glass, slipcast
carved porcelain
$380
3 Ocean #3, 2020
slumped glass, slip cast
porcelain, cast leaf
$520
8 Ocean #8, 2020
slumped glass, slip cast
carved porcelain, cast sticks
$490
4 Ocean #4, 2020
slumped glass, slip cast
porcelain, cast leaf,
$490
9 Ocean #10, 2020
slumped glass, clipcast
carved pierced porcelain
$390
5 Ocean #5, 2020
slumped glass, cast leaf,
constructed porcelain
$450
10 Ocean #11, 2020
slumped glass
$250
27

List of works
11 Ocean #12, 2020
slumped glass, slipcast
carved porcelain
$380
16 Ocean #19, 2020
slumped glass, cast porcelain
sticks, slab construction
$140
12 Ocean #13, 2020
slumped glass, slipcast
carved, pierced porcelain
$580
17 Ocean #20, 2020
slumped glass, cast pierced
porcelain
$140
13 Ocean #14, 2020
slumped glass, slipcast
carved, pierced porcelain,
$480
18 Ocean #21, 2020
slumped glass, constructed
porcelain, slipcast porcelain,
$140
14 Ocean #15, 2020
slumped glass, cast porcelain,
slipcast, carved, pierced
porcelain
$520
19 Ocean #22, 2020
slumped glass, cast pierced
porcelain,
$140
15 Ocean #17, 2020
slumped glass, cast porcelain
leaves
$140
20 Ocean #23, 2020
slumped glass, slipcast carved
constructed porcelain,
$140
28

List of works
21 Ocean #26, 2020
slumped glass, slipcast
carved pierced porcelain
$140
Page 18-19: Jo Victoria, Ocean #13, 2020. Photo:
Brenton McGeachie
Page 20-21: Robyn Campbell, Blaze, 2020. Photo:
Courtesy of the artist
Page 22-25: Transference installation view, 2020.
Photo: 5 Foot Photography
29