Justine Allison

Since graduating from Camberwell College of Art in 1998, Justine Allison has devoted her practice to the meticulous hand-building of porcelain, a material whose fragility and translucency she finds endlessly compelling. Her work investigates the fine balance between function and ornament, often drawing upon the forms of everyday domestic objects—such as jugs, vessels, and cups—as starting points. Rather than reproducing their utilitarian role, she reinterprets them as sculptural objects, inviting viewers to appreciate their aesthetic presence and quiet poetry.

Each piece is characterised by a refined simplicity that allows the natural qualities of porcelain to take centre stage. Justine works with great precision, using subtle patterns, delicate textures, and carefully applied glazes to achieve unique variations across her collections. Thinness and movement are vital to her approach: surfaces curve gently, edges ripple, and the clay seems almost weightless. A key element of her practice is her fascination with the way light interacts with porcelain. She embraces its translucency, creating objects that shift in appearance depending on their environment, capturing moments of stillness, shadow, and illumination.

Originally from London, Justine was deeply influenced by the city’s architecture, rhythms, and sonic landscape. The structural repetition of buildings, the layering of sounds, and the interplay between solidity and openness became early sources of inspiration. After relocating to rural Wales, her work gradually absorbed new influences—shaped by the natural world, the changing seasons, and the slower pace of life. These surroundings brought a new sense of calm and organic flow to her practice, infusing her pieces with a dialogue between the built and the natural, the urban and the rural.

Her evolving body of work continues to bridge these two worlds, creating ceramics that are both grounded in material tradition and alive with contemporary sensibility.