Jane Aitken is a Perth based ceramicist who creates hand-formed and thrown ceramics using either porcelain or stoneware clays. Techniques of slab building, coiling and pinching are done to create her forms and then a variety of decorative applications applied.
Jane mostly takes her inspiration from the natural world – colours, texture, forms of the land and sea which offer limitless possibilities. Through her pieces she aims to capture the essence of our wild Australian places.
Her experiences of snorkelling with whale sharks, manta rays and hump back whales on the Ningaloo Coast provides endless inspirations for her ceramics with colour and movement conveying her profound experiences with nature.
With some of her work, she uses a textural approach with tactile quality by playing with the nature of unglazed surfaces by applying coloured slip and then carving through the colour on the surface while responding to the form of each vessel.
Other decorative techniques can be used which include Sgraffito, Mishima and Nerikomi.
Her ceramic journey is one of constant experimentation with a variety of techniques and its possibilities of form, surface imagery and decoration.
