Ashraf Hanna

Lauriston Gallery, 10 August 24 - 05 October 24

Originally from Egypt, world class maker Ashraf Hanna now makes from his studio in Pembrokeshire. Over more than 25 years of making, Ashraf has become a highly collected artist with work held in a number of significant museum collections. Both Ashraf’s ceramics and his most ambitious glass work to date have been purchased by the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

Other collections holding his ceramics include the Ariana Museum in Geneva, the National Museum of Wales and the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge. Though a smaller part of his practice, Ashraf quickly made a significant impact within the glass art community, winning the British Glass Biennale Award for Best in Show and having his glass work purchased for the permanent collections of the Bullseye Glass Company in the USA and Ernsting Stiftung Alter Hof Herding Glass Museum in Germany. In addition Ashraf’s work is on display within homes throughout the UK and internationally.

This is the largest collection of Ashraf’s ceramic and glass work to be shown in the North West.

Ashraf Hanna began his career as a ceramicist in 1997, creating striking forms using various kiln firing techniques. After establishing a successful practice, Ashraf undertook an MA in Ceramics & Glass at the Royal College of Art, completing his studies in 2011. It was during this time that the style of Ashraf’s work began to develop and change, working with groups of large scale ceramics and being exposed to glass as a new material in which to create his distinctive forms. In 2013 Ashraf was awarded a Creative Wales Award by Arts Council Wales which allowed the time to take forward the forms and ideas that he had developed at the RCA. 

Growing up in Egypt, Ashraf was surrounded by pottery forms that have changed little since the ancient times, classical forms that have filtered through the ages, touched and formed by the hand of the potter. These forms were functional - storage jars and water cooling urns. However, during his time at El Minia College  of Fine Arts, observing these objects through still life compositions in his drawing classes, Ashraf  saw the beauty and contentment that exist within a well considered and executed form.

The skills Ashraf developed through drawing have been fundamental to his making practice. Developing the skill needed to make a mark on paper to denote a line from a three dimensional object has translated into a direct interaction between the hand and lump of clay, his fingers are no longer just used to hold the pencil, but to exact an immediate gesture manipulating the solid mass of clay.

Ashraf’s vessels surpass functionality, creating a more poetic andmeditative approach to his making. 

Curator: Michelle Keeling