JOHN WARD (b. 1938)

John Ward (b. 1938) studied Ceramics at Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts later in his life after initially working as a cameraman at the BBC. During this time in the 1960s, he studied under Lucie Rie (1902-1995) and Hans Coper (1920-1981), amongst others. Ward established his first workshop in London in 1971 before moving to his current studio in Wales in 1979. An early supporter of his work was Henry Rothschild (1913-2009), who included Ward in a number of exhibitions in his influential Primavera Gallery in Cambridge. The vessels are hand built and have simple forms, but with complex structures with the shapes cut and altered. His oeuvre is said to have drawn influence from forms of ancient Chinese and Egyptian pre-glaze pottery, as well as early Cypriot and 10th-century Persian bowls.