kil.n.it Experimental Ceramics Exchange

kil.n.it Experimental Ceramics Exchange 2024-2025

Igniting creative connections through clay and wood

I’ve been moving logs with the Bobcat. Santa can I please have one? Closed and lit the kiln, picked flowers as kiln offerings, fantastic inspirational and life changing residency. I stoked the kiln 5am - 1pm for five days, this kiln is massive and takes about 600- 700 kilos of clay. It’s been labour intensive, sweaty, a lot of hard work and absolutely wonderful

I can’t thank you enough for giving us the opportunity to learn the wood-firing process. This place is truly magical and my brain is exploding with learning

More experiments came home from kil.n.it, it’s fun science when the claybodies and glazes mix to make unexpected crazy, cool stuff.

Packing orange pots into the orange Subaru. Will be diving into the colourful world of majolica on residency at kil.n.it for the next two weeks! The enormity and amazingness of this residency opportunity is sinking in - pinching myself.

Crater and crawl glaze tests on porcelain and wild clay. Eeeek! Mentor @mudgrub bringing all the knowledge and passion for mixing.

Adrienne Richards and Kate Robinson

Bringing together two different communities, kil.n.it’s Experimental Ceramics Exchange
2024-2025 is a project founded in ancient traditions and reimagined in a contemporary
context.

As experimental ceramic artists, we explore the medium’s foundational use of life’s
elements: earth, water, air and fire. Clay is one of the oldest mediums of expression and has
deep connections to ancient and traditional practices in human cultural development through
the control and use of fire. kil.n.it experimental ceramics studio in Glebe NSW, provides
spaces for artists to continue exploring this medium. Our vision is that experimental ceramics
is celebrated as a significant art form, contributing to contemporary conversations, issues
and stories.

The inspiration for developing a project that spoke to our vision arose from a serendipitous
connection with Andrew Gray, CEO of South East Arts, who was working with kil.n.it as part
of a City of Sydney initiative to support their Creative Industries through business
mentorships. In 2023, with Andrew’s encouragement, we applied for and were granted
funding from Create NSW for an Experimental Ceramics Exchange to foster a collaboration
of skills and ideas between inner-city ceramic artists and the NSW South East Regional arts
community.

We looked at what we do and provide at the kil.n.it studios, what we could offer a regional
arts community and at the same time, what they might offer us. Working out of converted
nurses quarters behind Glebe Library in inner-city Sydney, while at the centre of a lively arts
community, ki.n.it is limited to electric kiln firings. The NSW South East region also has a
lively arts community and is home to a number of established wood-firing studios.

For the 2024-2025 Exchange, kil.n.it partnered with Bandicoot Pottery, a wood-fire studio at
Cobargo and the regional gallery, South East Centre for Contemporary Arts (SECCA), Bega.
Over the year, the project involved a series of residencies and workshops in South East
NSW and in Sydney, culminating in Kindling, an exhibition at SECCA (14 February – 10 April
2025).

Gabrielle Powell and Daniel Lafferty at Bandicoot, who know the elemental power of fire,
having perfected the art of wood-firing over more than 30 years, saved their house but not
their studio and kilns, during the horrific bushfires of 2019.

They shared their expertise one-on-one with the three kil.n.it artists in preparation for the firing
held at Cobargo in July – August 2024, and via an online course for the rest of the kil.n.it group
so they could contribute works for the kiln.

The resident artists were accommodated close to Bandicoot Pottery
and were inducted into the ancient art of making with wild clay, natural and ash glazes, as
well as packing and stoking the kiln over a period of 14 days. They also took up
opportunities to meet and connect with South East Regional ceramic artists.

Thanks to Team Bandicoot for their determination and enthusiasm - you have given us a happy pottery heart. Thank you to everyone for your love of pottery, learning about fire and community - let the fire keep shining on for you all!

Wonderful to spend time with our visiting artists, soaking up their infectious enthusiasm - three completely different approaches - each open to experimentation and bringing and sharing their own knowledge.

Inspired by Lewis Hyde’s concept of the ‘gift economy,’ Kindling embodies the spirit of reciprocal exchange - where knowledge, resources, and creative energy circulate freely, forging lasting relationships between artists and communities.