Giles Watkins (b.1995) was born, lives and works in London.
Education
Royal College of Art, London, MA Ceramics and Glass (Sept 2021 - 2023)
Glasgow School of Art, Glasgow BA (HONS) - Sculpture and Environmental Art (Sep 2014 - June 2018)
Kyoto Seika - Kyoto - Exchange program, Sculpture, (Sep - Dec 2017)
Camberwell College of Arts, London - Art Foundation (Sep 2013 - Jun 2014)
Giles' work aims at capturing the fleeting nature of his immediate surroundings. His current project uses an animal tracking camera as a research tool, taking thousands of images on night walks, building up a visual story and archive of the city and the times we live in and incorporating his own memories and connection with London. Giles draws from the effects of blank slate urbanism and the intrinsic value of the home. His images are activated via a totally unique ceramic/print process that uses oxides and stain, distorting in the kiln, transforming a hard-tone screenprint into a ghostly, continuous tone image, existing in a space resembling absconded snapshots, memories and experiences.
These images complement his sculptural work that plays on similar themes and seek to use material connections between place and community. Through the use of glaze surface decoration, printmaking, and form, Giles highlights the rich amalgamation of colours, forms, and people within his observations of the capital. His recent large-scale tower-like sculpture draws on the topography of Kilburn High Road, a high street he grew up near which is an enigmatic example of London's capacity for almost overwhelming cultural layering and exchange.
These ceramic screen prints were made from selected images taken whilst walking in London over the last year. They are printed using a method I have developed. I wanted to find a way of distorting the images from there original hard tone bitmapped print. Using glaze and a specific recipe of underglaze and oxides to achieve a motion blur effect. Using gravity with the slabs held at an angle in the kiln whilst firing. Referencing the fast paced state of flux at the heart of my subject matter. A continuous tone is formed via the oxides mixing in a semi controlled way. Turning them back towards a more photographic language. In printing on porcelain fleeting moments can be solidified into an impermeable and fixed state.
This large sculptural work consists of modular parts that were press moulded using stoneware. The work responds to my photography. By focusing on the Kilburn High road. A street that I grew up near. Each component is a reference to a particular memory, material or visual phenomena witnessed on the street. It was an attempt to capture the pastiche of different communities, and visual palimpsest that make streets like Kilburn highroad so unique not just in London but globally.
As a side project to my main practice. I have been researching a little known ceramic process that originates in the late 18th centaury in Staffordshire, known as granite ware, it uses granulated coloured clay pressed into a slab making up a decorative surface. Holly and I noticed that there was a cross over in our materiality with Holly working with granular frit glass. We have been developing a line of lamps that aimed at complimenting each materials similarity/ difference. With the base being ceramic and opaque and Shade being translucent emitting a warm light when lit.
