Dark Blue Tiles (Pigeons and Circles), 2021

Katrin Moye is a Nottinghamshire-based ceramicist whose work draws on historic ceramic forms and incorporates contemporary political and cultural commentaries in an often-humorous way. She illustrates parallels between contemporary life and their equivalents in social history with her hand painted, wheel thrown and handbuilt ceramics. Her intricately decorated versions of recognizable shapes from European ceramic antiquity explore themes such as the menopause, classic literature, cod Latin, slang words and dirty jokes. These sometimes rather cheeky contemporary vessels are made within the context of European decorated earthenware, focusing in particular on the styles of Italian Renaissance Maiolica and Dutch and English Delftware. She has work in public and private collections worldwide.

Katrin Moye spent her childhood in East Sussex with her brother, her German mother and British father, mostly drawing or reading. She studied English and Art History at Nottingham University, and spent 15 years working as a bookseller.  Her obsession with clay began during an art foundation course at Hastings, Sussex in 1987. A further course in ceramics at Morley College, London a few years later made her decide to leave work and start her ceramics practice, which celebrated its 20^th anniversary in 2024. She initially made small batches of hand painted, wheel-thrown tableware and refined her techniques and skills by trial and error, gradually moving away from the purely domestic/functional towards more elaborate, ornate pieces such as tulipieres, embellished vases and recreations of historical European ceramic vessels.

The research element of Moye’s practice is very evident in her output and many of her pieces are directly linked to examples of historic European ceramics found in collections at museums such as the Courtauld Institute and V&A in London, the Bowes Museum in County Durham, Waddesdon Manor in Oxfordshire and the Maiolica Museum in Deruta, Italy. In 2017-18 she was Artist in Residence at Nottingham University’s Lakeside Arts Centre, which led to her completing the change in direction towards the larger scale, concept-led work she is known for today. Her ‘Menopause in Maiolica’ collection was selected by the Crafts Council for inclusion in 2024’s ‘Collect Open’ at Somerset House, and pieces in this series were acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum.