Craft / “Unpredictable: an exploration of soda vapour glazing 2004 – 2022” by Maryke Henderson At Watson Arts Centre until September 11. Reviewed by MEREDITH HINCHLIFFE.

MARYKE Henderson began her life in ceramics while working as a craft aide and made her first pot – a small, round pot – on a wheel. Viewers can see that modest pot at the start of this exhibition. 

Henderson works intuitively – and her pots show a lively spontaneity of glaze and surface.

In her catalogue essay, Janet DeBoos likens glazes, which are placed over the raw clay form, as a “kind of ‘overcoat’ of colour and decoration applied to the surface, which inevitably conceals as much as it reveals”. She explains how Henderson discovered “vapour glazes”. The material used in the process of low-temperature firing, often sawdust or leaves, gives off fumes or vapours. These penetrate the still-porous clay giving different marks and effects on the clay surface. 

Henderson moved to Canberra, to learn more and be with more ceramic artists, and flirted briefly with wood as a firing material, but she felt this didn’t make sense once she was living in suburbia. 

At her teacher’s suggestion, she put a few pots in a soda kiln – and she was hooked with the result. She developed clay bodies specifically for soda firings, which provided all the effects she was looking for and continues to make her own clay. 

The flashes of colour, the smooth marks, the areas where slip – when applied – pools, or runs, or burns more quickly all contribute to the impact of the pot. She has created dynamic surfaces with indentations or diagonal ribs giving tension to the lines of the form.

There is a subtle interplay of technique and materials. 

This exhibition is the work of a confident, experienced artist who is completely at home with her materials. She makes quite large forms, whether they are tall tree forms, bowls or bottles. Several bowls begin with a thrown base and then Henderson coils clay around the form, building up the walls. 

For many of her pieces, Henderson uses no glaze or slip before firing the forms. The surface is created during the firing, through interaction of flame and soda vapour with exposed high alumina clay body surfaces. She uses a lot of soda, which is fed into the kiln every 10 minutes for two and a half hours.

However, she has begun to introduce a copper glaze, on rounded bottle forms, giving green and pink flashes to the form.

This is an outstanding exhibition. Everything comes together and it has the “wow” factor.