Getting Making – Details, episodes & analysis

Maiko Tsutsumi studied furniture making and Japanese lacquer work in Kyoto before moving to London to study furniture design at the Royal College of Art and later completing her practice based PhD The Poetics of Everyday Objects. After leaving the furniture industry She was course leader role for MA Designer Maker at Camberwell College of Arts, until 2020, alongside making objects, curating exhibitions and writing.

She now works in her studio in Peckham, making objects from wood, ceramic and lacquer. We spoke about her approach to making, where it stems from and how it manifests now in a measured approach engaging deeply with the materials she works with and seeking certain qualities from it. We weren't going to talk about kintsugi, and then ended up talking about it anyway!

• Maiko Tsutsumi website

These podcasts have been kindly supported by funding from CCW Research (University of the Arts London) and the Centre for Circular Design.

Simon Fleury originally trained as a photographer, making and developing physical photographs. He came to conservation incidentally, training on the job and transitioning from technical worker to become a conservator.

Simon and I met at Victoria and Albert Museum back in 2018 when I was artist in residence there. Our conversation here is about Simon’s work on exploring the pioneering practices of curator Richard Redgrave and the photographic condition documentation of the Raphael cartoons.

Richard Redgrave worked at the South Kensington Museum (as the V&A was known then), and around 1864 he produced a series of annotated photographs of the Raphael cartoons. In producing these ‘condition reports’ he began a method still in use by conservators today.

We also talk about Simon’s work on adapting perspectives and thinking around contemporary conservation work.

• Victoria and Albert Museum blog: Mattering: Richard Redgrave and the curious practice of drawing on museum objects - written by Simon Fleury
• Victoria and Albert Museum blog: Back to te Future: Revisiting the Richard Redgraves Condition Reports
• Museum of Care
• The Raphael Cartoons · V&A

These podcasts have been kindly supported by funding from CCW Research (University of the Arts London) and the Centre for Circular Design. Thanks also to porject manager Meghan Hutchins and illustrator Debbie Powell.

Mariah Nielson’s background as an architect has informed her work as a curator and design historian. She worked as curator at the Museum of Craft and Design, San Francisco, (2009–2011) and as director of the JB Blunk Residency (2007–2011). In 2013, she completed an MA in Design History at the Royal College of Art and the Victoria & Albert Museum, London. Mariah also co-founded the design brand Permanent Collection.

We talk about how she now cares for and stewards her fathers estate, work and legacy, in her role as director of the JB Blunk estate and Blunk Space; living in the home her father built, and conserving a home and archive situated in the woods.

• JB Blunk estate Instagram
• JB Blunk website
• Mariah's instagram
• Mariah Nielson's website

Thanks as always to CCW Research and the Centre for Circular Design who funded this podcast, project manager Meghan Hutchins and illustrator Debbie Powell who helped bring it to life.

Tommaso Corvi-Mora (b. 1969) is artist and gallerist. He opened his first gallery in London in 1995. Corvi-Mora, the gallery, represents a swathe of artists, and creates conceptual links between contemporary art and ceramics, showing works by Sam Bakewell, Shawanda Corbett, Myra Greene and Julian Stair amongst many others.

After enrolling in an evening ceramics course in 2009, he quickly discovered his love for the medium and has been making work ever since. In 2013 his gallery was one of the first to incorporate the work of notable ceramic artists within a contemporary art programme.

His own ceramic works have been exhibited internationally, including Salon 94 in New York, at the ICA Milano, Tristan Hoare and Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, both in London, and also in various presentations curated by Duro Olowu. He was an Award Winner at the 3rd Edition of the Open to Art Ceramic Award, Milan in 2019 and his work was selected for the 61st Faenza International Prize for Ceramics in 2020.

I first encountered his work in 2016 at Camden arts centre in the show “Making and Unmaking” which was curated by Duro Olowu. It was a very tactile show, with political implications to much of the work, and I was struck both by the vessels he made and that they were displayed low to the ground.

He brings a particularly unusual perspective to our conversation, as he is a professional curator and gallerist, works with artists and collectors, and is also a maker and collector himself. I was really pleased to speak with him in his lovely office above his gallery space, surrounded by works in his collection. We talk about collecting and displaying objects, collecting as a child, and planning for the future of your collection.

• Making and Unmaking exhibition, curated by Duro Olowu
• Tommaso's Instagram
• Corvi-Mora

Thanks as always to CCW Research and the Centre for Circular Design who funded this podcast, project manager Meghan Hutchins and illustrator Debbie Powell who helped bring it to life.

Jacqueline Winston-Silk is a curator at the Archives & Special Collections Centre, University of the Arts London. She looks after the Camberwell Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) Collection, which is what most of our conversation centres on.  We talk about organising, storing and handling the collection, an unusual selection of design objects, studio pottery and other things originally brought together as an educational tool and loaned to schools.

https://collections.arts.ac.uk/collections/camberwell_ilea

Theres a couple of glitches in the recording of this, where the internet dropped out, apologies!

Thanks as always to CCW Research and the Centre for Circular Design who funded this podcast, project manager Meghan Hutchins and illustrator Debbie Powell who helped bring it to life.

Danielle Thom is a curator, currently at London’s Design Museum, and also a writer, broadcaster and lecturer. She has a dual focus on contemporary craft and design, and eighteenth-century sculpture and decorative arts, and works to locate objects and images in their wider social and cultural contexts. 

Amongst other things, we talk about the different approaches to conservation she has come across in her career and balancing a curatorial approach to your home with actually living in it. She speaks about the deaccessioning process, and about working with un-typical museum objects, sharing with us her curator experiences in some amazing museums.

Danielle’s website

V&A: Plaster cast collection

Museum of London: London Making Now

Museum of London: Pleasure Gardens

Design Museum

Hidden Treasures of the National Trust: Series 1, Episode 2

Thanks as always to CCW Research and the Centre for Circular Design who funded this podcast, Meghan Hutchins and illustrator Debbie Powell who helped bring it to life.

Hello and thanks for tuning in! This is a short introductory episode of my podcast, Getting Making, where I explore how we care for objects.

About 5 years ago I started thinking more explicitly about mishaps and care in relation to things. They were both topics which were very present in my practice and research around repair, but seemed to shine through a bit differently to other ideas I found floating around there. 

A bit more object and practice based research, and some informal chats later, I decided to start recording some of those conversations, as they were becoming more interesting and more pertinent in the world we live in now. I spoke to a philosopher and a writer, an artist activist, curators, a conservator, and makers, and these conversations became my Getting Making podcast. Hopefully you will enjoy them as much as I did.

bridgetharvey.co.uk

@bridgetharvey

Thanks to CCW Research and the Centre for Circular Design who funded this podcast, project manager Meghan Hutchins and illustrator Debbie Powell who helped bring it to life.