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usually igneous rock. She is interested in showing inclusions and additions and taking the work to the extreme. Regel f inds these additions on building sites in London, from manufacturers of kitchen worktops, and roadworks where cobbles might be. She uses slips and simple glazes, usually commercially available. She f ires pieces multiple times, allowing the kiln itself to be creative. She will join unfired clay to f ired clay, trusting that by f iring really slowly they will fuse by the hand of the kiln. She named Phyllida Barlow as an inf luence and that she feels close to the way she works, its materials, its clarity and its relation to music, and that Barlow’s kindness, generosity and humility also comes to mind. She mentioned Anselm Kiefer, for the same reasons, but also for his critique of history; Alina Szapocznikow, and how her work relates to the body; Ewen Henderson for his attitude to clay and its received rules; and Claudi Casanovas for the release from the convention that clay vessels needed to be thin walled. Other ceramicists walk on by, tut-tutting at Regel ’s work, or they are intrigued. Many resort to asking technical questions, perhaps a way of f inding a way into the work. Many have questions about whether it qualifies as beautiful. It took her years not to feel affected by the rejection. EXUDING LIFE At this point it is crucial to note that Regel joined the Harrow Course at the University of Westminster, which, for several interesting reasons, is no longer with us. There she completed the whole curriculum, including throwing, glaze-making and wood-firing (she still loves wood-fired work). What stayed with her was clay as a thing in itself, and how, when f ired, it is f ixed into a monolith that is permanent but capable of exuding life. This she carried through to her MFA at the Royal College of Art, where Emmanuel Cooper was her hero, and where I f irst encountered her work. Still in my mind’s eye is the sight of a thigh-high sculpture on the f loor, heav y, red and glowing, asserting itself unambiguously. To Regel, a work is successful when it has mystery about it, when it has life. When it is as fresh at the end as it was at the beginning. A work is successful when it thrills her as she opens the kiln. She does not seek approval elsewhere. Her main challenge at the beginning of her career was to survive and remain honest to her work. There was no business training. She is not good at promoting herself and networking and hopes her work speaks for itself. She no longer f inds creative blocks challenging, but sees them, LE F T: Huba Buba, 2023 RIGHT: Raining Stone, 2022 16 May/June 2023
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and life, as part of the process. They used to be ‘ lows’, but no longer. She f inds it particularly exhilarating when the work moves out of familiar territory and forward. A recent highpoint is seeing her old work, made in Poland, anew. Regel wants us to understand that the idea does not desire to become a clay object, and that clay was a choice made by her. It was a pure artistic choice and a particular endeavour. Recently her colours have become more delicate, closer to her current emotions, but still in visual tension with the shapes. She makes fragments and moments of the place she grew up in: a happy family in an apartment block in the middle of a forested landscape, a short distance from the sea. Silence is the appropriate attitude with which to view her work, and time is required. Her work locates itself somewhere between allusion and a resemblance to things and refuses to mimic what is already in the world. It intrudes quietly, its maker out of view. For more details visit anetaregel.com; @anetaregel; Memory Landscape, 28 April–17 June, Sarah Myerscough Gallery, sarahmyerscough.com REGEL’S JOURNEY • 1996–2000: Fine Art Academy Sculpture, Gdansk, Poland • 2003: BA Hons (1st Class) Ceramics, University of Westminster, London, England • 2006: MA, Ceramics, Royal College of Art, London, England • 2012: Puls Gallery, Brussels, Belgium • 2015: Blås & Knåda, Stockholm, Sweden • 2016: Metamorphosis, Salvatore Lanteri Gallery, Milan, Italy; Gneiss, Carpenters Workshop Gallery, Paris, France • 2017: Second Nature, Jason Jacques Gallery, New York, USA • 2021: Nomad, Jason Jacques Gallery, New York, USA • 2021: Shapes From Out of Nowhere, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA • 2022: Exquisite Rupture, Jason Jacques Gallery, New York, USA May/June 2023 17

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and life, as part of the process. They used to be ‘ lows’, but no longer. She f inds it particularly exhilarating when the work moves out of familiar territory and forward. A recent highpoint is seeing her old work, made in Poland, anew.

Regel wants us to understand that the idea does not desire to become a clay object, and that clay was a choice made by her. It was a pure artistic choice and a particular endeavour. Recently her colours have become more delicate, closer to her current emotions, but still in visual tension with the shapes. She makes fragments and moments of the place she grew up in: a happy family in an apartment block in the middle of a forested landscape, a short distance from the sea.

Silence is the appropriate attitude with which to view her work, and time is required. Her work locates itself somewhere between allusion and a resemblance to things and refuses to mimic what is already in the world. It intrudes quietly, its maker out of view.

For more details visit anetaregel.com; @anetaregel; Memory Landscape, 28 April–17 June, Sarah Myerscough Gallery, sarahmyerscough.com

REGEL’S JOURNEY

• 1996–2000: Fine Art Academy Sculpture,

Gdansk, Poland • 2003: BA Hons (1st Class) Ceramics, University of Westminster, London, England • 2006: MA, Ceramics, Royal College of Art,

London, England • 2012: Puls Gallery, Brussels, Belgium • 2015: Blås & Knåda, Stockholm, Sweden • 2016: Metamorphosis, Salvatore Lanteri

Gallery, Milan, Italy; Gneiss, Carpenters Workshop Gallery, Paris, France • 2017: Second Nature, Jason Jacques Gallery,

New York, USA • 2021: Nomad, Jason Jacques Gallery, New

York, USA • 2021: Shapes From Out of Nowhere, The

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA • 2022: Exquisite Rupture, Jason Jacques

Gallery, New York, USA

May/June 2023

17

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