Kerry Harker

From a series of six bone china plates produced in the Royal Crown Derby factory during a residency in Derbyshire. The residency formed part of the Vickers Award, a new biennial award which I was recipient of in 2003-4, culminating in this exhibition at Derby Museum and Art Gallery in 2004. The series of plates re-imagined scenes from the history of the porcelain trade in the UK, including its origins in trade relations with Eastern countries, specifically Japan, as well as the current status of these antique imported wares as priceless art objects bought at auction for small fortunes. To tell and reinvent this story, the plates used traditional decorative techniques such as hand-painting and the laying down of ground colour areas, as well as modern techniques such as lithographic transfers and rubber stamping. I conceived the plates as a series of paintings displaying narrative scenes, the irony being that ceramic plates are not normally seen as ''high art'' equal to painting, or shown in a contemporary art gallery setting.