People and Places

Janeen Page shares how she creates her pottery from local materials

Article by Your Home and Garden

Janeen Page is a true rock star, making gorgeous ceramic glazes from her explorations of the earthVisitors to Janeen’s coastal studio and garden are welcome. She’ll also be opening her doors for the Taranaki Arts Trail and holding a workshop on rock glazes during Nelson Clay Week.

Janeen Page has always been a maker, happiest during the journey of a piece rather than the final destination. “Most of my life is focused around ‘the doing’ – the end result, the cups, bowls and kitchen vessels that others get to enjoy,” she says.

The Taranaki potter is going back to the earth to source her glazes from all around Aotearoa, which includes quarry dust and brickwork floor sweepings, to create the most gorgeous colours and creations. In her spare time, she documents her findings about New Zealand rocks and their potential uses so that others can follow along and find out more about her discoveries.

How did you get started as a potter?
In 2003, I moved back to Taranaki after being away for 10 years. I had a fine arts degree and wanted to gain more practical skills and study. The local pottery club ran evening classes, and they were more accessible than any other form of study at the time. I went once a week for many years, then bought a wheel for home, setting up in my old laundry space, which my dad painted for me.

Like many skills, pottery is a learned practice and I just kept at it.

Janeen Page’s pottery is made using New Zealand clay.

Describe a typical day in the studio.
I download an audiobook or a podcast, which I usually line up the night before as a bit of a carrot. I usually prepare all my clay the day before and know what I need to make or assemble. Then, I set myself a few targets and work toward them. The better the book, the more I get done – and I only ever listen to books in the studio so it’s a great incentive. Some days I don’t get back in the house until dinner time.

Where do you source your clay from?
The reason I chose pottery as a medium was because I could access New Zealand materials – environmental sustainability is important to me, and working with local products presents creative opportunities to work with their unique characteristics. I use 100 percent New Zealand clay from the Waikato.

You’ve created a blog documenting the location of New Zealand rocks and their potential uses for natural ceramic glazes. What inspired this in-depth investigation?
All glazes are essentially rock and minerals, I’m just using them unrefined. Potters from all over New Zealand sourced a glaze material from Parininihi/Mt Messenger, Taranaki. A local six-million-year-old mudstone, eroding along the roadside was gathered to make a tenmoku glaze [a glossy, black, dark brown or maroon iron-rich glaze].

When researching New Zealand rock glazes, I found a publication from 1960 by Mina Bondy detailing sites around the country where she had collected rocks to make glazes. Most of the recipes were only brief descriptions, with no colour or results, so in 2020 I set about collecting and testing her research, documenting it digitally and in colour. This is all documented in my blog on my website. Mina Bondy was a phenomenal woman who was sadly overlooked in New Zealand potting history.

Janeen’s studio was once the old Tataraimaka cheese factory’s machine room.

What’s something you wish people knew about New Zealand rocks?
While studying Fine Arts at the University of Auckland, I studied Te Kete Aronui Māori Art and Material Culture. As Pākehā, it taught me a lot about how indigenous cultures value the environment.

For Māori, rocks are whenua and ancestors; they hold a deep spiritual connection. As makers we need to consider whose land we source our materials from, both here and abroad, and the impact that extraction has on the environment and the people.

How do you collect your rock glazes?
I like to source materials from industries where they are considered by-products or waste, including dust from quarries, wood ash from fireplaces and floor sweepings from brickworks. The rock I use is igneous rock, which means it’s volcanic in origin.

Roadworks and building sites are a wealth of materials for potters, as long as you speak to the right people. Often, when researching, I like to spend time in an area, talk to locals and gain an understanding of the land, how it’s formed, local quarries and who the traditional owners are, so the rock is sourced ethically for both current and traditional landowners.

Do you have an idea how the colour of the glaze will turn out in the kiln when you collect your rocks? Or is it a wonderful surprise?
Many of my recipes are converted from Oriental glaze recipes. They are thousands of years old, and as long as I fire them hot enough, the only surprises are the beauty of melting rock and ash into colour. Often each piece is unique from the flame of the gas kiln, and inclusions in the clay and glaze.

Stoneware glazes were often brown and composed of a single natural rock or clay mixture with a small amount of wood ash. Iron is the main source of colour; this with wood ash gives a palette of soft greens, brick reds, and the real magic is in the Chun blues and Nuka whites.

How does pottery help to bridge the gap between your love of domestic pottery and your love of sculpture?
Vessels are a part of our domestic lives. We use them to eat and drink on a daily basis. To be able to make them gives me great pleasure as does knowing that the objects people use daily in their homes are no longer mass-produced “whiteware” with no origin story. I like that these everyday utility pieces can hold meaning, therefore people are more likely to treasure them for longer.

What’s been your favourite creation to date?
My favourite creations are often my test pieces. I have more than 80 glazes from different locations across the North and South Island, from each place I visited and photographed. I know how each rock is formed, how many million years ago, whether a glacial rock dust like Lake Pūkākī or volcanic ash of Taupō each hold a story of the land from which it is formed. Each glaze is named after where it is sourced in Aotearoa.

Any exciting things in the works?
This year is also the 50th anniversary of Driving Creek Pottery in Coromandel, home of the renowned late New Zealand potter Barry Brickell. I will be heading there to work on a special edition glaze for their product range.

Over the winter I’ll be preparing for the Taranaki Arts Trail – this will be my fifth year participating in the October open-studio arts trail. In addition, I have applied to be on the Sustainable Backyard Tour, which is part of the Taranaki Garden Festival. I love welcoming visitors to my studio and garden, and it’s a fabulous opportunity to purchase my wares for your loved ones (and yourself) in time for Christmas. And, amongst all of this, I’m also very excited to celebrate contemporary ceramics and participate in Nelson Clay Week in October once again, where I’ll be holding a workshop on rock glazes.

How can people support you and your wonderful pottery?
By subscribing to my website you get access to the special releases and one-off pieces I have available throughout the year. I stock some wonderful design stores that support New Zealand makers around the country – a list of these stores can be found on my website.

@janeen.page.pottery
janeenpage.com

Text Caroline Moratti Photography Gina Fabish