Duff Gallery

17/05/2026

11/03/2026

Ceramic sculpture. 1958 Measuring 42 x 27cm. Stoneware (Vitreous slip / 20 piece mould) Fired 1300º> in Sump oil kiln.

Once again he rubs the outside with Iron oxide and coats the inside with the white, the effect this time on these slim angled forms, conjuring up a feeling of ancient bone and horn.

Fired up by the results of the virtuous slip, Derek is on a roll, and soon starts to play with more abstract forms, building the shapes solid, and casting them in plaster, this piece being incredibly tricky, having been cast from a twenty piece mould. These casting skills were a credit to Frank Dobson his sculpture tutor at the Central School of Arts and Crafts, who taught Derek the process, especially the use of the little metal shims to separate each area of plaster mould. I haven’t heard of potters often using this technique, its usually attributed to the sculptor. (As a child, I remember wondering what these huge white, rough finished structures were, lurking in the corners, the massive moulds, strapped and tied, laying dormant, like alien pods waiting to hatch.)

09/03/2026

Vase. 1958 Stoneware Vitreous slip) Measuring an impressive 49 x 78 cm tall. Fired 1300º> in Sump oil kiln.

One of my all time favourites. I look at this massive piece and feel so proud of my father and what he had to overcome in order to make this. The kiln building for a start, involved Derek single handedly carrying tons of heavy duty kiln bricks, up flights of garden steps, before constructing it. Ruth, my mum couldn’t help, having just had her first child, Cleo, a month before he started the build.

Once again, came the question, are they ceramics or sculpture? Derek called this a vase. Only Henry Rothschild, founder of Primavera, was brave enough to stock Dereks bold pieces, in his London gallery. Derek was far before his time, with his approach to ceramics, and it wasn’t really until the 1970s in the UK, that the likes of Richard Slee, put large slip cast ceramics in the limelight.



If Derek was to take the following ingredients:

His love for artists such as Matisse and Hepworth,
The passion for the experiment,
The technical knowhow to mould build from Dobson,
Helen Pincombe’s simple reliable stoneware glazes,
An introduction to surface finishes from Marshall,
Pleydell-Bouverie’s encouragement with the kiln,
And his hunger to discover,

Then the catalyst he needed to ignited and fuse them, was John Warren-Davis.

With results such as these.

06/03/2026

Horned Sculpture 1958 Measuring 33 x 29 cm Stoneware (Vitreous slip) Fired 1300º + in Sump oil kiln

Between 1957 and 1962 Derek achieves a total of 16 firings with his sump oil kiln, the fire brigade being called out on numerous occasions by startled locals, seeing the ominous black smoke rising above the town.

The most immediate help and advise with kilns, came from Ray Marshall, who having previously work with Ray Finch at Winchcombe for a while, had settled at a village called Stedham, not that far away. It is also interesting to note that Ray was working with manganese stained work, with glazed interiors at this time, a similar technique that Derek adapts for the vitreous tableware and this Horned Sculpture.



It was very fortuitous, that at this time, Derek meets John Warren-Davis, a contemporary sculptor and teacher in wood, bronze, stone and aluminium. John and his wife Ann, live just up the road from Arundel, and Derek and Ruth become good friends, dropping in from time to time with them, and it was during one of those early visits that John, an acquaintance of Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson, tells Derek, of how during the liberation of Paris in 1945, he had met the sculptor Brancusi, and how this meeting changed his life.

John Warren-Davis in turn influenced Derek, affecting a change in his direction, allowing him to see things from a new perspective. Derek, who had been itching to play with stoneware, and glazes and all the possibilities of reduction firing, now wanted to explore new forms and step further away from his comfort zone. Encouraged by the words of Warren-Davis, Derek starts looking at the possibilities of creating some sculptures of his own in ceramic and never, truly looks back from this point, forever exploring new corridors, he continually visits all the latest exhibitions in London, right up to his dying days. He had always loved the work of Matisse, Picasso, Modigliani and Kandinsky, and since news of 'The American Action Painters' started filtering in, had been desperately waiting to see them for real.

06/03/2026

In the latter part of the 1950s Derek made a number of sets for the table. As these are asymmetrical he choses to slip cast them; making a clay original and taking a paster mould from it. When you pour liquid clay (slip) into this mould, the plaster draws in the moisture, which in turn firms up the clay, immediately next to it. After a short period, the slip is poured out, leaving a residue, the wall of the pot.
This means you can make repetitious forms, perfect for sets.

06/03/2026

1955-58 saw Derek continuing to develop his domestic ware, the pieces getting larger and more adventurous, as he starts to learn throwing and slip casting.



In 1956 the Hillesden group disbanded, with Derek and Ruth moving to Duff House in Arundel, Sussex.
Derek, not wanting to jeopardise his connections in London, moves swiftly, almost seamlessly from the Hillesden studio, into the new studio. Having arranged for 3 phase electrics to be installed, the kiln is soon connected up, and he is ready to continue where he had left off. It was less than five weeks between the last firing at Hillesden and the first firing of the same kiln in Arundel. I can’t imagine that happening today.

02/12/2024