Meet Astrid, the hands that shape the work.

Astrid’s fingers fell in love with clay while studying Fine Art.

Ever since, the inspiration Astrid finds in the natural world has been transformed into beautiful, sculptural ceramics by her imagination and accomplished hands.  In her studio in Nottingham Road, KwaZulu-Natal, she creates awe-inspiring contemporary ceramics that grace spaces across the globe.  

Throughout her career as a ceramic artist, Astrid has played with the flexible and organic nature of pure clay, experimenting with different techniques to express the possibilities of the material, and the images that crowd her head.

Inspired by light and shadow, seeds, sound, flowers and colour, the process begins with a conversation with a block of clay.  Astrid never quite knows where it will lead as each coil builds on the previous one to reveal shapes that balance tension and gravity.

“I don’t try to recreate something exactly - it is more a feeling of the natural form. I use the language of clay, a medium with limitless potential, to express this in a way that makes words superfluous.”

Astrid’s hands do most of the work. Quietly, she spends hours coiling, shaping and sanding to allow the natural forms to find their voice. It is a slow, meditative process. A collaboration between her hands, the material and gravity which creates vessels that feel grown rather than made.

“There's a rhythm to the work that grounds me. Somewhere in the process, the form reveals itself. The light shifts across the hills outside, my hands shaping something that didn't exist yesterday”.

Although the ceramic sculptures are heavy, the pieces evoke lightness and fragility. Astrid works mostly in black and white clay to celebrate the purity of this natural material and allow the artworks to respond dramatically to the changing light wherever in the world they land.