Clay Fever: A passion for pots Bridget Foreman and Helen Walsh
Event details
Behind every museum display stands a remarkable – but usually unseen – archive. In the case of the Centre of Ceramic Art’s WA Ismay collection, housed at York Art Gallery, Ismay’s extensive archive contains a fascinating correspondence – stretching over decades – between Bill Ismay and the potter, Michael Cardew.
Drawing on those letters and York Museums Trust curator Helen Walsh’s research, Bridget Foreman’s Clay Fever is a tender and revealing play, opening up the world of the 20th-Century Studio Pottery movement through the decades-long friendship between collector and potter. It explores the hold that pottery exerts over them both, and the bond it forges between two extraordinary – and very different – men.
The performance was filmed as part of the 2018 Restating Clay conference at the Yorkshire Museum and will be accompanied by a talk with pottery handling by Helen, whose research inspired the play, and playwright Bridget.
Please note: The event will take place in the first-floor studio theatre which is only accessible by stairs.
Find out more about Riding Lights Theatre Company and York Art Gallery.
About the speakers
Dr Bridget Foreman is a playwright and Senior Lecturer in Playwriting at the University of York and Associate Director of Riding Lights Theatre Company. Her work has been presented in theatres and on tour across the UK and internationally. Her writing credits include My Place and Surprise Ending (Riding Lights Theatre Company) The Whispering House, Clay Fever (York Museums Trust) Everything is Possible - the York Suffragettes (York Theatre Royal / Pilot Theatre) Simeon's Watch (Riding Lights Theatre Company), In Fog and Falling Snow (co-written with Mike Kenny) for York Theatre Royal / Pilot Theatre, Airlock (Company of Angels / Theatre Café) Inheritance, (Riding Lights Theatre Company) Fantastic Acts and Monsieur de Coubertin’s Magnificent Opymlic Feat! (RLTC), In the Shadow of the Quarks (York Theatre Royal / Playhouse) Beyond Measure (York Theatre Royal / Back and Forth), Salaam Bethlehem (RLTC), Pinocchio (York Theatre Royal / Shysters / Full Body and the Voice), Black Market (RLTC), Calvary - a passion play for York Minster, which also toured Australia prior to a run in Brisbane, the premiere adaptation of the satirical novel Augustus Carp Esq, (Friargate Theatre) and the award-winning musical Dick Turpin for Riding Lights at Friargate Theatre. Recent writing includes The Bare Bones, in development with York Theatre Royal, Cups on a String for Riding Lights (national tour 2024) and His Last Report, a large-scale community play for York Theatre Royal, for production in summer 2025.
Dr Helen Walsh has a background in crafts and has worked in the museums sector since 2001. She has been the curator in charge of York Museums Trust’s important contemporary British studio ceramics collections and of the historical ceramics collections since 2004. Her work on a number of exhibitions at York Art Gallery, includes 3 Collectors, Honest Pots, Excitations and the touring exhibitions Gordon Baldwin: Objects for a Landscape and PICASSO: Ceramics from The Attenborough Collection. Helen founded the UK’s Contemporary Studio Ceramics Subject Specialist Network in 2012. She helped lead the establishment of the Centre of Ceramic Art (CoCA) at York Art Gallery, which opened in 2015. Helen completed Doctoral research on the WA Ismay collection through Manchester Metropolitan University in 2017, and has written and presented a number of articles and conference papers relating to this research and to York Museums Trust’s wider ceramics collections. She is currently supervising an AHRC CDA student doing research of York Museums Trust’s collections, in partnership with Manchester Metropolitan University and the British Ceramics Biennial. Helen is a judge on the Henry Rothschild Bursary selection panel, a member of the CraftNet committee and a trustee of York’s Stained Glass Centre.
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