Email: janemillar93@gmail.com
Instagram: @jmillarstudio
Words about my ceramic work
I make hand-built, mainly wall-based ceramic works.
Artists statement
My wall-based and free-standing ceramic sculpture and installation starts with the idea of energy within the unseen interior of a ceramic object, and its actions on a surface. The work explores a territory between ideas of what is natural and unnatural. Recent works in both ceramic and mixed materials deal with un-locatable resemblances, repetitions, echoes and memory; between material culture, body, extra-terrestrial and earth.
Planets, moons and meteorites... Their battered or smooth, scratched and stained, inlaid and exploded shapes and surfaces result from unseen interior actions, and unstoppable exterior energies. The shapes are coiled, punctured, pushed, bombarded and encrusted. They are chemical portraits too - of oxides, silica, carbonates...
Test Dummys...I very rarely make tests for surfaces and glazes, preferring to encourage disaster and unknown consequences. These small forms are based on baby dummy and bottle teats, and are often tests for trying out new processes. I am building their numbers to make a wall-full.
CV
JANE MILLAR
EDUCATION
2008 - 2012: UCL IoE MA, Education in Museum and Galleries
1987 - 1989: Royal College of Art, MA Painting
1984 – 1987: Canterbury College of Art, BA Hons Fine Art
1983 - 1984: Cardiff College of Art, Foundation Course
EXHIBITIONS & PROJECTS
Two week sculpture residency, Hogchester Arts, November 2021. Selected by Chantal Powell (director), Clare Burnett (RSS President), and Domo Baal.
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS
2021
In (Matters of the Soul), ASC Gallery, London. Curated by Darren O'Brien.
Sarah Staton's Supastore Southside, Slingbacks & Sunshine, South London Gallery. 9th July to 5th September.
Can We Ever Know the Meaning of These Objects? Installation with the Associated Clayworkers Union. Curated by Sarah Sparkes and Kevin Quigley, Gallery 46, Whitechapel, London.
Pretty Ugly, Thameside Studios Gallery. Curated by Andrew Ekins. (16 artists including Nicky Hirst, Phil Allen, Nick Fox, Phyllida Barlow, Andrew Ekins, Paul Cole, Katie Pratt)
2020
Pending San Mei Gallery, Brixton, London
A Personal Perspective Selected by Liz May, APT Gallery, Creekside, Deptford
Fuzzy Objects, San Mei Gallery, Brixton. Three person show (with Nicky Hodge and Janet Currier). Essay by Roxy Walsh
New Doggerland (part 2), Thameside Studios Gallery. Curated by Jane Millar.
2019
Creekside Open, selected by Brian Griffiths, APT Gallery, Creekside, Deptford
We Can Only Have Fun On Certain Days, Warbling Collective, Stour Space, Hackney
New Doggerland, Lumen Gallery, London. Curated by Jane Millar
Slow Life Solo show, Coffee is my Cup of Tea, Hackney. Curated by Richard Ducker
2018
40 Celsius - ASC Open, selected by Tabish Khan, Visual Arts Editor for the Londonist, Grafton Quarter Exhibition space, Croydon.
Space Shift, APT Gallery, Deptford. Curated by Sarah Kogan.
Ghost Tide, curated by Monika Bobinska and Sarah Sparkes, Thames-side Studios Gallery,Woolwich.
Cosmic Perspectives, Lumen Group Open, Ugly Duck, Bermondsey, London.
Votive, Southwark Cathedral, for the Thames Festival, with the Associated Clay Clayworkers Union.
More in Common, APT Gallery, Deptford. Curated by Deborah Gardner.
2017
The Discerning Eye 2017, Mall Galleries, London
Creekside Open 2017, selected by Alison Wilding
Small Worlds, selected for PS Mirabel, Manchester, part of Manifest.
2016
Design & Architecture, Studio 73, Brixton
Unnatural Histories, SPH gallery, Chatham, Kent
2015
Conway Actants, residency and site-responsive project at Conway Hall, London, with sculptor Deborah Gardner. ACE funded.
2013
The Curious Exchange, Dulwich Festival 2013, commissioned by Southwark Arts for Dulwich Festival.
2012-13
Curious, a site-specific art trail at West Norwood Cemetery. Devised and curated by Jane Millar. Funded by The Mayor of London
The Pilgrimage Project, Wilton’s Music Hall. Curated by Sophie Herxheimer.
The Hanky Show, London Printworks Trust.
Two –person show, with Jane Ward, Studio 73, Brixton, London.
1992 - 2003: Represented in solo and group shows by England & Co, London.
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS 1995 - 2010
2009: An Tobar, Mull, with the LAND2 group | 2008: So Near So Far, five artists, APT Gallery | 2007: Peer Esteem, Five Years, Hackney, London | So Near So Far, Ebersberg Kunstverein, Ebersberg, Germany | 2006: The Technology of Enchantment, Menier Gallery | Particular Places, Toni Heath Gallery, London. Solo show | 2005: LAND2, Beyond Landscape, RWA, Bristol | 2004: LAND2, Beyond Landscape, Dean Clough Galleries, Halifax | BRIXTON ARTISTS: 198 Gallery, Railton Rd, Herne Hill | 2003: Artbridge residencies, Sheridan Russell Gallery, London | 2000: The Freud Museum, London. Launch of FOLD : The Newspaper of the Unconscious, curated by Jane Millar | 291 Gallery, London. Launch of customized editions of FOLD | 1998: Ground, Catalyst Arts, Belfast | 1995: DAD, Gasworks, Vauxhall’ London.
CURATORIAL WORK
New Doggerland at Lumen Gallery, 2019, and Thames-side Studios Gallery 2020. An evolving artists' project and exhibitions, imagining future lands and humans. Devised and curated by Jane Millar.
Kursaal 2013-2014. An Associate Research Curatorship, with ACE strategic funding, for A Fine Line, with Barney Hare Duke and Jeremy Theophilus; researching and developing an exhibition of contemporary crafts in Southend.
Curious: Two site-specific art trails at West Norwood Cemetery, in 2012 and 2013. Project curator. Funded by The Mayor of London.
The Curious Exchange, 2013. A performative public artwork, funded by Southwark Council for the Dulwich Festival.
2000: FOLD: The Newspaper of the Unconscious, an artist's publication.. FOLD launched at the Freud Museum and 291 Gallery, Hackney.
COMMUNITY PROJECTS AND WORKSHOPS
2018: Space in the City; a drama and dance performance. I ran workshops with the children attending classes at Longfield Hall in Brixton SW9, to make stage and performance props. I ran costume workshops for the adult dance group for the same event.
2015: Conway Actants; As part of the site-specific project with Deborah Gardner, I ran an art workshop for local school children. I also devised and convened a seminar and discussion with guest speakers from Club Critical Theory, based in Southend.
2012 - 2013: Curious Art Trail at West Norwood Cemetery. Community projects that I devised and ran include the art work and performance ENON, with the medical historian Ruth Richardson; The Curious Picnic to celebrate the Common Burial area at WNC, with food, music, performance; workshop decorating a cardboard ship to the afterlife, made by artist Marc Elmes.
2005: I was commissioned by Lambeth Arts to make a A Carnival Train for the Stockwell Festival, funded by Southwest Trains. Workshops were based at Slade Gardens Adventure Playground, with local children and young people attending the play centre.
2003: Artbridge and Paintings in Hospitals Residency with residents at a care home, to create a communal artwork, now in the PiH collection.
BROADCAST MEDIA
BBC London Radio 94.9 2013 to 2015: researcher and contributor to the Saturday morning show, with Jo Goode and Simon Lederman, presenting Curious London, sites and events to visit on the weekend.
19th July 2013: The Robert Elmes show, presenting and discussing the Curious Art Trail at West Norwood Cemetery.