JULIAN STAIR OBE

Julian Stair PhD (RCA) OBE has exhibited internationally since 1982 and has work in over 30 public collections including the V&A; British Museum; Museum of Art & Design, NY; Mashiko Museum of Ceramic Art, Japan; Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Kolumba Museum, Cologne.

From rites of passage to the daily touch of a cup, Stair’s work celebrates the multivalence of pottery through the dynamics of use. His work encompasses the domestic and the monumental, the studio and the factory floor, and has been sited in a diversity of environments from places of worship to columbaria, reflecting his long-standing enquiry into the somatic identity of pottery. Julian is also a historian of English studio ceramics completing his thesis Critical Writing on English Studio Pottery: 1910-40 in 2002. He has held research posts at Northumbria University, Newcastle; Royal College of Art; University of the Arts, London; Westminster University.

He edited The Body Politic: the role of the body in contemporary craft (Crafts Council, 1999) and, with Clare Twomey and Christie Brown, co-edited Contemporary Clay and Museum Culture (Routledge, 2016). He has been published by the Tate, The Courtauld Institute of Art, Yale Center for British Art, Leeds Art Gallery/Kettles Yard/Dulwich Picture Gallery, Bloomsbury and Routledge.

Selected solo exhibitions since 2012:

Quietus: the vessel, death and the human body (mima Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art; National Museum of Wales; Winchester Cathedral; Somerset House, London, 2012-14; Manchester Cathedral, 2016) The Matter of Life and Death (York St Marys, York Museums Trust, 2013) Quotidian (Corvi-Mora, London, 2015) Equivalence (Corvi-Mora, London, 2018; ICA Milano, Italy, 2019) Julian Stair: art, death and the afterlife (Sainsbury Centre, UEA 2023)

Julian is also working towards a multi-site exhibition in the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden (2024), a two-person exhibition with Shoji Kamoda (1933-1983) in Mashiko Museum of Ceramic Art, Japan and an inaugural solo artist exhibition at Hamada’s Old House as part of a residency in Mashiko next year.

He received an OBE in 2022 for services to ceramics.

He is represented by Corvi-Mora gallery.