Walter Keeler has been a potter for over forty years and has just been made Welsh Artist of the Year. He studied at Harrow Art School under the esteemed Michael Casson. He works from his studio just outside of Monmouth in Wales, where Marsha O’Mahony caught up with him to talk pots, wales, awards and art.
Congratulations on your Welsh Artist of the Year Award. Can you tell me a bit more about it?
Around seven years ago St David’s Hall in Cardiff inaugurated the competition to find the Welsh Artist of the Year. And last year I was asked to be a judge for the Applied Arts section of the competition. However, the number of entries wasn’t great and I was surprised at the low standard of the work. For this year’s competition I was ‘encouraged’ to enter and I did because I wanted to give it my support and I felt it was important that artists with a higher profile should put in for the competition. Generally, however, I am not a believer in competitions in art and didn’t think I would win anyway. So it was quite a surprise when I did win. It was good that an applied artist won in a fine art area because it completely opened up the competition. The hope is that even more people doing interesting work will put in, artists who really believe in what they are doing. I definitely wanted my work in the competition because it represented visual arts in Wales and it takes people out of their studios and into the public arena.
Do you consider yourself a Welsh Artist?
Well I’ve lived just outside Monmouth for 32 years, therefore in Wales! I feel engaged with Wales and it matters to me to be in Wales. This is where I live. There has always been a slight snigger about arts in Wales i.e. there is nothing significant in arts in Wales. Yet I feel very much part of the arts community in Wales and I want to continue to contribute to that.
Are you a potter or ceramist?
Well, ceramists work with ceramics and potters work with pots. And I am a potter. I admire peasant pottery in indigenous cultures and pots of the pottery industry in the UK. Making pots is at the very heart of what I do. Pots are fundamentally bound up to human life. We all have an intimate relationship with pottery. But for me, as a potter, it’s not just about the use of pots, but how they have affected people, made their world change. A pot can offer a challenge. It can play games, joke, and threaten. Then in some way people have to participate in that.
How long have you been a potter?
Over forty years now. My dad loved history and I would visit museums with him. While he was looking at the document section I would wander off to more exciting things like the Egyptian mummies and I soon discovered old pots and fragments of pots. I also used to do mud larking along the Thames as a child and found bits of 17th and 18th Century pots, glass and coins. Soon I was able to work out what part of the pot these bits were by comparing them to pots in the museum. So by the time I became a student I had accidentally gained an insight into how a pot was made. I had an instinct for how things should feel, the anatomy of a pot. I still look at pots in museums now. The more you know about a pot the more they speak to you. It’s like a dialogue really.
Does it still excite you?
Oh yes. But it can be a chore at times and making pots is incredibly difficult and it gets harder. I have worked hard to gain the reputation I have and now I can’t make enough pots. I would like to take more control of my life and take out the drudgery, the business side of things. If I’m not actually producing pots then I feel I’m not working. Yet the reality is I am running a business and that also requires my attention.
How do you keep your work fresh?
I don’t know. Sometimes I think I haven’t done anything new, and then all these people say, ‘wow, look at all these new ideas’. But I am always curious, always trying to find a new way of moving things along. Sometimes it comes as a revelation and suddenly I have found a new avenue. That’s always a good feeling.
What impact would you like your work to have?
That if affects someone on some level. What more can you ask for as a creative person. I get so much that is positive by engaging with pottery that I hope it is conveyed. I want to communicate what excites me. I want to be authentic and make pots that are believable and make a connection.
What do you aspire to?
To make better pots all the time. As you grow older what you make will change because who you are will change also.
And your inspirations?
Oh that comes from all different places and at subliminal levels. For example I like pruning in the garden and there has been a definite connection between gardening and some of the handles I have been making. I sketch and draw my ideas and then allow them to develop in a more organic way.
Do you have any advice for young artists starting out?
Stick at it. Be determined, persistent and committed. Believe in what you are doing. If you don’t please yourself, be committed to your vision, then nobody will.
Editor’s note: The Welsh Artist of the Year Exhibition is currently showing at St David’s Hall in Cardiff, where some of Walter’s work can be seen.
