At the foot of Shaun Clark’s garden sits a modest shed — easy to overlook at first glance, yet quietly brimming with the textures of a life devoted to making. Inside, a kiln waits, packed to the lid with freshly fired creations: Egyptian cats and painted panels, still just a little too warm to touch.
The shed itself feels almost fit to burst, its shelves crowded with pottery, tubs of oxides and glazes, brushes, and an assortment of images from past work, alongside fragments of inspiration and pinned quotations. Sketchbooks rest nearby, their pages dense with drawings and observations — living records of his daily world. And then, almost as an aside, a small collection of medieval musical instruments catches the eye, hinting at another, less immediately visible thread in his creative life.
Creativity, it seems, does not stop at the shed door. The whole household shares in it: Shaun’s partner Christine is also an artist, working from a converted garage studio of her own, creating a quiet dialogue of making across the garden. “I’ve always wanted to make things,” Shaun reflects. “I guess it’s in the genes.”
The lineage is unmistakable. His father was a welder; generations before him, his granddad, great grandad and great uncle were sign writers for the railways in the 1930s, and another great uncle built and painted fairground wagons. Craft, in its many forms, runs through the family like a steady thread — practical, skilful, and quietly creative.
Shaun’s own path, however, was anything but linear. As a young student, he was drawn first to photography, captivated by “the proper old school process, darkrooms, chemicals, photo paper.” Yet a brief work placement swiftly extinguished that ambition. “It was thoroughly miserable and killed any ambitions,” he says with honesty.
Instead, he found his way to art foundation at Doncaster College in 1989, where curiosity led the way. “I tried virtually everything,” he recalls, “especially loving the textiles and printing disciplines.” Pottery, notably, held little appeal at the time. It was plaster and sculpting that captured his attention, leading him to an industrial ceramics course in Stoke-on-Trent — a city synonymous with the craft.
There, Shaun immersed himself in process. “Two years of mould making and slip casting… more process which I loved.” A fortunate transition scheme then took him to Cardiff, where he completed a studio ceramics degree rooted in hand-building and decoration — “basically doing the exact opposite to Stoke.” By the end of his formal education, Shaun had assembled what he describes as “a bit of everything under my belt.”
For over two decades, his creative life ran alongside a career in museums and education. As a tour guide, he became a storyteller, absorbing fragments of folklore and history that would later find their way into his work. “I always had lots of stories and fillers,” he says. “It inevitably seeps into my work along with my love of nature.”
It is this narrative sensibility that defines Shaun’s ceramics today. His pieces — often populated by creatures both familiar and fantastical — feel as though they belong to a world just beyond reach. “I like to find stories and folklore behind my designs so they work on a deeper level as well as being highly decorative,” he explains. “There are little hidden tales, sometimes jokes in the designs.”
Technically, his work is a careful balance of industry and intuition. “My work is a strange amalgam of industrial and studio techniques,” he says. He avoids the potter’s wheel where possible, preferring the tactile immediacy of slab-building. “I don’t enjoy throwing so keep it to a minimum.” Hollow forms are slip cast, and every stage — from raw clay to finished piece — is undertaken by Shaun himself. “I make the models, the moulds, everything from start to finish… right from a bucket of mud and a bag of gypsum.”
His creatures, he says, often dictate their own forms. “Certain forms lend themselves to circular bowls, such as the octopus. Others like to have a long shape, such as a leaping hare.” Surfaces are primarily hand-painted, though he occasionally incorporates transfer printing or gilded details “if I’m feeling indulgent.”
The rhythm of the studio reflects this duality. In the shed, time shifts between physical labour and quiet concentration. “Some days are mucky ones… stirring clay, slabbing, slipcasting,” he says. “Whereas others are clean painting days, sitting down, radio on, oxides and brushes and green tea at hand.” It is a practice that demands both discipline and surrender. “Studio time is precious… it’s very easy to play and lose hours, sometimes going down rabbit holes — sometimes literally.”
Like many, Shaun faced profound disruption during the pandemic. Redundancy, illness and bereavement reshaped his daily life and creative output.
“It was a very difficult time… I hardly made any pottery.” Instead, he returned to drawing — a foundational skill instilled during his time at Doncaster. “It’s a very basic discipline which I love to return to above all other art forms.”
That grounding in observation continues to inform his work. He recalls a formative teacher, an ex-draughtsman, who would send students out to draw multi-storey car parks. “He would make us disentangle the architecture whilst (we suspected) he went to the pub for the afternoon,” Shaun says with a smile. “It was a very good lesson and I am very grateful.”
Now, Shaun’s work will be presented in a new exhibition at Cath Ray Gallery this July. Titled Into the Valley, the show draws loosely on ancient Egyptian art and symbolism. “It could mean the Valley of the Kings,” he suggests, “equally it could be the Trent Valley — or a metaphor for taking solitude from the outside world through art.”
It is an evocative premise, one that aligns seamlessly with Shaun’s layered approach to storytelling. His influences — from Grayson Perry to Steven Bird — are evident not in imitation, but in spirit. “They both wind a narrative into their pots,” he notes. “I love lots of Australian contemporary ceramic art… it has a vibrancy and energy and lacks the heavy baggage of European pots.”
And yet, Shaun’s work remains distinctly his own: rooted in place, shaped by history, and gently playful. Even the name of his studio — Whisker Hills — carries a sense of story. The woodland itself was designed by Humphry Repton, a successor to Capability Brown, in the 18th century. Today, it forms the quiet backdrop to Shaun’s daily practice, a living reminder of the layered narratives that inform his work.
There is, too, a lighter side. “It’s also an excuse to play the Skids very loud,” he admits — a small, telling detail that captures the spirit of an artist who balances reverence with irreverence, tradition with experimentation.
As Into the Valley opens this summer, visitors can expect more than ceramics. They will encounter a world — one shaped by memory, myth, humour and craft — where every surface holds a story, and every piece invites a closer look.
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For the latest news and events at Whisker Hills Pottery visit www.whiskerhillspottery.co.uk
You can purchase work by Shaun Clark, Whisker Hills Pottery on Folksy shop: www.folksy.com/shops/whiskerhillspottery
Exhibitions
4 Jul - late Aug
Into the Valley
Cath Ray Gallery, Bridgegate, Retford, DN22 7UZ.
4 Jul
Heritage Skills Fair
The Craft Village, Four Seasons Shopping Centre, Mansfield, NG18 1SU.
11 Jul
Heritage Skills Fair
Market Place, Gainsborough, DN21 2BP.
18 - 19 Jul
Thoresby Ceramics Fair Thoresby Park. NG22 9EP.
2 Aug
Revesby Country Fair
Boston, PE22 7NB
9 Aug
Egyptian Mask Making Workshop
Cath Ray Gallery, Bridgegate, Retford, DN22 7UZ.
15 Aug
Retford Makers Market
Bassetlaw Museum
Amcott House, 40 Grove Street, DN22 6LD.
5 Oct - 2027
New Brewery Arts Group exhibition “Joy”
Brewery Court, Cricklade Street, Cirencester, GL7 1JH.
