Message in a vase
- Marie often writes messages on her pieces with slip
- She has travelled the world learning pottery in many different cultures
- Her salad bowls decorated recipes are one of her best-selling items
Born in France, Marie Martin lived in the Alps until she was 18. "At the age of 10, I received a toy pottery wheel for Christmas, but because it made too much mess, I could not use it as much as I would have liked," she says. She studied art history both in her native country and in Ireland, and later started working in Barcelona. "In 2007, an opportunity took me to China and I took the chance to start ceramics, a discipline that still fascinated me. I began practising in a local workshop and discovered the stages of the manufacturing process and the importance of respecting each one," explains Marie. In 2015, another change took her to live in San Francisco, where she managed to enroll in a public university to take ceramic classes. "That year, I wrote one of my grandmother's recipes on a salad bowl and gave it to my brother. His reaction was so positive that I decided to do the same for other families. Since then, this family recipe salad bowl has been my best-selling product."
Interview
- What is it about ceramics that attracts you so much?
- Working as a ceramicist feels like being in the right place. There is nothing else I would rather do, even though I have had quite a few different jobs in the past. I am where I need to be.
- How do you use slip?
- I work on the wheel, and when the pieces are in a leather-hard state, I write on them with slip. It is a technique that I have refined over time, creating a special tool to achieve the desired effect.
- What do you write?
- On my ceramics I write lyrics from songs, poems, and other texts that are linked to memories, whether they are mine or other people's. My work is heavily based on memory, but also on the collective memory of our civilisation.
- Do you enjoy interacting with other artisans?
- Yes, I like to meet them. I work alone in my studio all year round, but a few times a year I participate in fairs and I love being face-to-face with the public, seeing their reactions in person. That is when my creativity is at its peak, and I usually feel eager to return to the studio to create new pieces.
Marie Martin is an expert artisan: she began her career in 2007
Where
Marie Martin
