CLAY 2025 Opening Talk and Market Preview

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CLAY 2025
Friday 5 December Opening Talk and Market Preview
Laura Aldridge from Sculpture House Paisley and Dr Robin Wilson from Oxford Kilns
6-7pm in the Hospitalfield Picture Gallery
Free but please use the link by clicking on the green arrow below to book your place.
From 7pm please Join for a drink after the talk and a viewing of the market which will open for sales at 11am to 3pm Saturday 6 December
For the opening of CLAY this year we are delighted to be joined by Laura Aldridge and Dr Robin Wilson who will talk about their organisations, and the way they use the processes of ceramics socially, and within their own practices. At Hospitalfield we are always interested in organisational models that support artists. Sculpture House is an outstanding new model that artists have negotiated with Renfrewshire Council, whilst Oxford Kilns is nestled within Oxford Universities research culture.
Laura Aldridge is an artist and founding member of Sculpture House, an artist-led, community-facing sculpture studio in Ferguslie Park. Her practice spans sculpture, installation and collaborative making, with a focus on texture, touch, and sensory connection. At Sculpture House, Laura works closely with local residents, artists and community groups. Through this, she has seen clay emerge as the most consistently requested and loved material across ages and abilities. Clay is immediate, forgiving and deeply democratic - inviting play, experimentation and care, and offering a tactile way for everyone to build confidence, agency and creative expression through their hands.
Dr Robin Wilson of Oxford University’s Department of Archaeology founded and directs the Oxford Kilns, a long-term research and practice initiative spanning art, craft, anthropology and archaeology. Through the design and construction of experimental woodfired kilns —including the new kiln recently built at Hospitalfield— he examines how collective making and elemental transformation generate knowledge that is simultaneously technical, social and philosophical. The Oxford Kilns project treats clay and fire as co-creative agents: clay invites immediacy and touch, while fire introduces duration, uncertainty and shared risk. Each firing becomes a site of learning where cooperation is forged through labour, care and attention rather than instruction or hierarchy.