Jane Seymour

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Born in 1954, Jane grew up in the marshlands of Suffolk, and the valleys and mountains of Wales. She had an unconventional upbringing with little formal training, but was encouraged by her parents to be creative in crafts; birthday presents included a weaving loom and supplies of drawing books. In her artwork and ceramics she is mainly self-taught, although strongly influenced by her mother Sally Seymour, who was an artist and potter and her father John Seymour who was a travel writer, broadcaster, and author of self-sufficiency books. Both sets of grandparents were also artists; her paternal grandfather AA Turbayne was an eminent book designer and bookbinding artist who set up the Carlton printers in London, and her maternal grandfather Frank Medworth who was head of the art department in Sydney.

For many years as a young mother Jane ran a small craft business in Wales with her wood-turner partner, painting on wood and silk and making clothes to sell in their craft shop.

In 1994 Jane moved to rural Co. Clare, Ireland, where she built a house and studio, and applied herself to ceramics. Not attracted to using glazes, and wishing to use her clay forms as a canvas for her drawings and decorative designs, she etches directly into the surface of the unfired clay, applying layers of oxides and stains which are re-applied to her multi-fired work, and often sanded down between firings. This gives a depth and texture to her hand-built ceramics.

She makes strong slab-built ceramic vessels with a controlled and defined surface decoration, inspired by the figurative, birdlife, and more recently the human form, working from her studies and life drawings. Her main artistic influencers are Modigliani, Gauguin, Picasso among other great artists.

Jane is a member of Portfolio Ireland; Ceramics Ireland; and is a selected member of the Crafts Potters Association London UK. Her work is in private collections, in Ireland, UK, and US, as well as by the OPW in Ireland. She has exhibited widely in Ireland, and in UK.