Ceramics Now Magazine - July 2026

Ceramics Now Magazine Issue 21 (July 2026) features the work of Nancy Bowen on the cover, shown in her exhibition From A to Z and the Bodies In Between at Nunu Fine Art, New York. Working like an artist-archaeologist, Bowen combines found materials, ceramics, ornament, and archival texts to reimagine language, history, and the female body.

This issue brings together essays, reviews, and reports that explore figuration, the relationship between vessel and sculpture, and ceramics in relation to land, history, and planetary imagination. Tana West examines clay, figuration, and fragmented bodies in Refigured at County Hall Pottery, while Katherina Perlongo reflects on the dialogue between vessel and sculpture in the GEFÄSS / SKULPTUR 4 exhibition at the GRASSI Museum of Applied Arts in Leipzig. In Beautiful Things After Empire, Anisio Veloso considers Rich Miller's work through the lens of beauty, history, and the legacies of empire. Alice Fyles offers a studio visit that questions the rules, classifications, and material expectations that shape ceramic making, opening up space for experimentation and unexpected forms of knowledge. The issue also features a preview of the Gyeonggi Ceramics Biennale 2026, Earth Makes, exploring clay, land, and planetary imagination in South Korea's leading ceramics biennale.

This issue presents featured artists Magdolene Dykstra, Chryssa Kotoula, Margaux Vié, and Jihyun Kim.

The exhibitions section also highlights RESPONS! Norwegian Ceramics 1975-2026 at the Center for Ceramic Art Ringebu, Norway; Moon Jar; An Axis at Gallery LNL and the Korean Cultural Centre, Sydney; Chidi Ukwuoma: Containing Matter at Matter Studio Gallery, Los Angeles; Subconscious Surfaced at Moderne Gallery, Philadelphia; and For Want of a Nail, the Golden Shoe was Lost at Studio Orta - Les Moulins, Boissy-Le-Châtel, France.