Expressive Clay: Handbuilding Without Limits

Join ceramic artist Holly Macdonald for an exploratory workshop that introduces fresh approaches to handbuilding, surface treatment and form. Moving beyond traditional techniques and expectations, Holly will guide you in creating expressive ceramic vessels and sculptures that celebrate experimentation, intuition, and the creative potential of clay.

Over this intensive five-day course, you'll have the opportunity to dedicate time to testing new techniques and developing substantial handbuilt works. You will learn and experiment with a range of handbuilding methods, including pinching, coiling, and slab construction. Alongside these construction methods you will explore colour and surface through the use of stained slips, ceramic crayons and clay body stain.

Through discussion, demonstration, and individual guidance, Holly will encourage you to trust your instincts, develop your own visual language, and create pieces embedded with personal meaning and experience.

Suitable for all experience levels, this course welcomes both beginners eager to explore clay for the first time and more experienced ceramic artists looking to expand their creative practice and approach to making.

All clay, slip and additional ceramic materials will be midfire, and are provided. A limited number of small-scale test pieces will be bisqued and glazed within the timeframe of the 5-day workshop. Selected pieces will be bisque fired in the NAS kilns after the workshop. Glazing short courses are offered in the Term One and Term Two programs.

Please note, it may take up to four weeks after your course ends for works to be available for collection. We will notify you when they are ready for pick up.

Course Schedule:
The following is an indicative course schedule only. The content and pace of the sessions may vary in response to the students in the program.

Day 1:
Focus 1: Slab construction
Focus 2: Ceramic stains - stained slips & clay body stains

Explore texture and working with stained slips, prepare test pieces for bisque fire

Day 2:
Focus 1: Coil building
Focus 2: Ceramic stains - crayons

Day 3:
Focus 1: Pinch pots
Focus 2: Self-directed project - one-on-one discussions to develop individual enquiry

Experiment with ceramic crayons, prepare test pieces for glaze firing

Days 4:
Focus: Self-directed project - ongoing individual guidance and feedback

Day 5:
Focus: Self-directed project - complete work for bisque firing

Unpack glaze firing of test pieces, discussion of results

Additional Information:
Due to the time constraints of the five-day format, final pieces will not be glaze-fired.

* The course fee incorporates the cost for materials such as clay.

* NAS Short Courses are open to students of ages 16 years and over. The NAS Art Club is open to students between 15 - 17 years of age. 

* What to bring? Please refer to the list of required materials in the Art Materials field below. 

Students must supply their own art materials, please refer to the list below.

• Towel and protective clothes (old shirt or apron)
• Notebook and pencils/pens
• Any ceramics tools that you may already have (e.g. sponge, needle tool, cutting wire, rubber kidney, potters knife)
• P2 KN95 disposable mask
• 3 - 5 x 250ml & 500ml lidded containers (e.g. yoghurt or icecream container)
• 3 x garbage bags (35L or larger)
• All clay and other materials are provided
• Enclosed footwear is essential in all studios on campus.

Holly Macdonald initially studied architecture and engineering before discovering her passion for ceramics. Her creative practice is founded in ceramics and combines hand building in clay with drawing, installation, and interdisciplinary collaboration to explore the dynamic relationship between maker, material and place.

Holly has exhibited work throughout Australia including solo exhibitions at Lake Macquarie's Multi-Arts Pavilion mima, Sabbia Gallery, and Firstdraft. In 2023 her work was included in Maitland Regional Art Gallery’s major exhibition 'Upriver Downriver' and 'TERRA NOVA: 70 years of Sturt Pottery' at Sturt Gallery. She has been a finalist in awards including the Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize, North Queensland Ceramic Award and the Gold Coast International Ceramic Award and in 2022 was awarded winner of the Brenda Clouten Memorial Art Scholarships.

As well as maintaining a studio practice, she teaches workshops and has contributed time and enthusiasm to organisations such as The Australian Ceramics Association and kil.n.it Experimental Ceramics, Sydney. She is a graduate of the National Art School and holds an Honours degree in Fine Art (First Class) from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.