In response to the “Reinterpreting the Collection” project, I’ve chosen a porcelain vase decorated with the pâte-sur-pâte (paste on paste) technique made by Louis Marc Emmanuel Solon in 1898 for the Minton factory. 

The pâte-sur-pâte decoration method includes brush painting with diluted porcelain slip onto the surface of the coloured unfired porcelain body. The liquid porcelain should be quite loose so it normally takes 30-40 layers to create each image. Producing pâte-sur-pâte requires an enormous amount of time (about 50 hours according to Solon) to decorate just a single piece.

I was interested to find out if it is possible to optimise the processes and produce objects faster. 

I used Parian porcelain to take my final pieces through just one firing. I also experimented with various water percentage content in slips for decoration and tried to use the opposite of a traditional pâte-sur-pâte scheme - putting coloured décor on the top of the white background. I was excited to try a multi-coloured decoration too.

While working on my vases and researching pâte-sur-pâte it came to my attention that the technique was contemporary to impressionism, post-impressionism, the Vienna secession art movements with their outbursts of colours and expression. 

Ceramic artists of that time had only metal oxides in their pallets to colour the background. I’ve chosen to use modern bright stains, almost plastic colours and different ways of layers application, exploring the idea of how pâte-sur-pâte pieces may look more contemporary to the times they were in demand.  

2021