Visit The Bottle Shop at Chippendale’s favourite boutique hotel, The Old Clare in Sydney, and it’s not longnecks or natural wine you’ll be taking home with you. It’s work from some of Sydney’s best emerging ceramic artists.
Until this Sunday August 25th, the pub-tiled, bar-next-door Bottle Shop – now a combined retail and gallery space – is hosting the Makerspace & Company Makers Market. The exhibition and pop-shop showcases the work of seven emerging ceramicists, who have all gotten their hands dirty at the MakerSpace workshop in Sydney’s inner west. Whatever your creative background or abilities might be, Makerspace & Company encourage people to reconnect with making through accessible workshops, classes and open studio programs.
‘The Bottle Shop is definitely not your conventional white cube gallery,’ says Kimberley Peel, creative project manager of The Old Clare hotel. And to that end, the works on show have plenty of personality, too: from Stephanie Phillips’ sculptural, earthenware animal series, with striking glazes and patterns, to EJ Son’s sunny vessels embellished with ceramic fried eggs. ‘It’s the kind of thing I’d love to see if I were travelling to another place,’ adds Kimberley. ‘The work in this exhibition is by locals, and feels really connected to Sydney and what’s happening here every day.’
Others artists presenting work at The Bottle Shop include Remy Pajaczkowski-Russell, Murray Topham, Rachael Paul and Natalie Levy.
‘I really believe that people are what makes a place interesting,’ says Kim. ‘There’s a great buzz and energy on Broadway, and this show really demonstrates the artists’ various perspectives on the world.’
Makerspace & Company Makers Market
The Old Clare Hotel
1 Kensington Street
Chippendale, Sydney
Open 12pm – 7pm until Saturday August 24th
And 10am – 4pm on Sunday August 25th