LAKRISTA | pottery is the ceramics studio of LaKrista Morton. LaKrista creates pottery drawing on textures and colours inspired by moving through and being still in wild places. By working with different wood ashes, oxides, wild clay, and neutral glazes, her work highlights the beauty and simplicity of natural materials. LaKrista trained as a scientist and she brings this careful, methodical approach into her ceramics. She uses systematic methods like tri-axial and line blends to test simple combinations of materials - often using specific sources of wood ash as one of the primary glaze ingredients. Through her methodical approach to developing forms and glazes, she works to create tactile and varied surfaces that retain a natural spontaneity, and link to subtle memories of place and light.
What does Scottishness mean to you?
Scottishness is the feeling of having a rooted connection to where I was not born. This feeling comes from a strong resonance of place. In walking - up hills and through valleys, and paddling - across lochs and down rivers, these landscapes have become familiar. Through experiencing them again, and again, in all seasons and weathers, familiarity has become connection. Colour, light, texture, and atmosphere stretch beyond memories linked to one hill, valley, loch or river. They tell a broader story of connection and resonance. Scottishness is the way the low light catches the purple branches of silver birch in early spring; distant hills become blue in summer’s atmosphere; soft sphagnum glows green amongst crumpled fronds of rusty bracken; and the way last season’s heather blooms turn to crystal beads in winter’s frosts.
What role does craft have in daily life?
As a potter, craft allows me to live as my full self, by being curious and engaging my mind and body in the creation of something that requires care and attention. It allows me to bring memories, places, and experiences into the tangible. Craft allows those who interact with it to feel the importance of care, of materials, of human-made. It gives the possibility of connecting with the work through their own experience, linking it to things beyond the inspiration that was part of its making.