Potter shapes art world

BY STEPHEN FORBES

Internationally renowned potter and ceramics artist Len Castle’s work has been displayed around the globe.

His life and work feature in a book published by the Lopdell House Gallery late last year.

Len Castle: Making the Molecules Dance won the illustrative category at this year’s Montana Book Awards and pays tribute to a man much admired by his peers.

Former Auckland Art Gallery and Auckland War Memorial Museum director Rodney Wilson first saw Len’s pottery and ceramics in the 1960s and describes him as an extremely important figure in the art world.

So it was no surprise to him when Len was made an Icon of New Zealand Art in 2003 by the Arts Foundation.

"Along with Barry Brickell, he is one of the foundation stones of New Zealand studio pottery," he says.

"Len is one of the great pillars around which New Zealand studio pottery has been built."

The 84-year-old Glen Eden resident, who turns 85 tomorrow, was born in Auckland in 1924 and grew up in Westmere.

He still recalls the first time he saw someone making pottery.

"I was 10 years old and my mother took me to the Easter Show where a potter called Oliver Jones was doing a demonstration."

Len went home that night with only one thing on his mind – how to make his own potters’ wheel. His plan didn’t come to fruition but the seed had been sewn for his future as an artist.

Len studied for a bachelor of science at Auckland University and was keen to become a geologist.

"Back in the 1940s there were very few opportunities. If you wanted to make a career as a geologist you had to join the New Zealand Geological Survey, or go overseas and work for an oil or mineral company," he says.

"So I thought I would play it safe and train as a secondary school teacher."

It was during his time at the Auckland Teachers Training College that he decided to try his hand at pottery after discovering an old potters’ wheel gathering dust.

He enrolled in night classes at Avondale College under the tutelage of Robert Nettleton Field, a highly regarded sculptor and painter.

"There was a limit to what he understood but he was extremely enthusiastic and I’m so grateful to him because he gave me a firm start."

Len was keen to master the art.

"I used to spend every spare minute I had learning what I could."

He started making his own pottery and selling it while working as a science teacher at Mt Albert Grammar.

Len was awarded a fellowship by the Associated Art Societies of New Zealand which he used to travel to St Ives in Cornwall, England, to study with potter Bernard Leach in 1956.

He finished his job as a lecturer at Auckland Teachers Training College in 1963 to focus on his art.

He says he knew it would be tough financially.

"But my wife was very supportive."

Len threw caution to the wind and helped establish the New Zealand Society of Potters that same year.

He also took up photography after being introduced to the geothermal areas of the central North Island by artist Theo Schoon.

"It started off as a way to record interesting things I found in nature," he says.

"But I also found it was a good way to record some of my early work."

Nature has always been an inspiration for Len’s pottery.

"The clay will suggest something so I will work on it and after I have finished I will think that looks like something I’ve seen before. And quite often I will have a photo of it.

"These things just well up in my subconscious."

Len went on to study pottery in Japan in 1966-67 and also exhibited his work while there.

"It was on an Arts Council fellowship," he says. "I spent most of my time in Kyoto and travelling around Japan visiting different potteries."

He built a new house in south Titirangi with a larger kiln during the early 1970s and continued to produce his pottery and ceramics.

Len became a Companion of the British Empire in 1986 and followed it up with a New Zealand Commemorative Medal in 1990 for services to the country.

He was declared an Icon of New Zealand Art in 2003 and became a Distinguished Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2004.

But he isn’t interested in pomp and ceremony – despite the honours and accolades.

"I like to be a low-profile person. I felt honoured to receive the award but my first instinct was to put it aside and get back to my work."

Len was given the opportunity this year to exchange the Order of Merit for a knighthood.

He turned it down, saying the honours system should be for New Zealanders as New Zealanders.

Len now works from a studio in Massey and reckons he’s getting better with age.

"I’m at the stage where I feel I’m at my most creative.

"I used to say I could hit the nail on the head occasionally – but now I can hit it on the head more often."

- © Fairfax NZ News