Dora Billington
Encyclopedia
Dora Billington was an English teacher of pottery
Ceramic art
In art history, ceramics and ceramic art mean art objects such as figures, tiles, and tableware made from clay and other raw materials by the process of pottery. Some ceramic products are regarded as fine art, while others are regarded as decorative, industrial or applied art objects, or as...

 and a studio potter
Studio pottery
Studio pottery is made by modern artists working alone or in small groups, producing unique items of pottery in small quantities, typically with all stages of manufacture carried out by one individual. Much studio pottery is tableware or cookware but an increasing number of studio potters produce...

. She was born into a family of potters in Stoke-on-Trent
Stoke-on-Trent
Stoke-on-Trent , also called The Potteries is a city in Staffordshire, England, which forms a linear conurbation almost 12 miles long, with an area of . Together with the Borough of Newcastle-under-Lyme Stoke forms The Potteries Urban Area...

  and studied at Hanley School of Art
Stoke-on-Trent College of Art
The Stoke-on-Trent Regional College of Art was one of three colleges that were merged in 1971 to form North Staffordshire Polytechnic...

. She worked as a decorator for Bernard Moore, 1912-1915, and then took a diploma in ceramics at the Royal College of Art
Royal College of Art
The Royal College of Art is an art school located in London, United Kingdom. It is the world’s only wholly postgraduate university of art and design, offering the degrees of Master of Arts , Master of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy...

 1915-1916. As the ceramics department was in danger of closure because of the war, she helped to run it with John Adams (who later ran the Poole Pottery
Poole Pottery
Poole Pottery is a pottery manufacturer, originally based in Poole, Dorset, England. The company was founded in 1873 on Poole quayside, where it continued to produce pottery by hand before moving its factory operations away from the quay in 1999. Production continued at the new site in Sopers Lane...

). On completion of her diploma, she became head of department. She continued to design for industry, working with J. & G. Meakin
J. & G. Meakin
J. & G. Meakin was an English pottery manufacturing company founded in 1851 and based in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire.-History:In the 19th century, J. & G...

 during the 1920s and 1930s.

She left the Royal College in 1924 to take up full time teaching at the Central School of Arts and Crafts, where she later became head of the pottery department. She emphasised the importance of handbuilding as the first stage of working with clay. Under her tuition, students at the Central School of Arts and Crafts were encouraged to experiment with tin-glaze decoration. She had an extensive knowledge of glaze technology and of the history of ceramics. Among her students were Quentin Bell
Quentin Bell
Quentin Claudian Stephen Bell was an English art historian and author.Bell was the son of Clive Bell and Vanessa Bell , and the nephew of Virginia Woolf . He was educated in London and at the Quaker Leighton Park School.Principally an artist, as a potter, he was drawn to academia...

, William Newland
William R. Newland (potter)
William Rupert Newland was a New Zealand born studio potter who lived in England after the Second World War.From 1945-1947 he studied painting at the Chelsea School of Art. He studied art education at the Institute of Education, 1947-8 where he learned pottery under Beth Wright, who sent him to...

, Gordon Baldwin
Gordon Baldwin
Gordon Baldwin born 1932 in Lincoln, England is an influential British studio potter.He studied at Central School of Art and Design and was teacher of Ceramics and Sculpture at Eton College...

, Ruth Duckworth
Ruth Duckworth
Ruth Duckworth was a modernist sculptor who specialized in ceramics. Her sculptures, as well as wall sculptures and monumental works, are mostly untitled...

 and Alan Caiger-Smith
Alan Caiger-Smith
Alan Caiger-Smith MBE is a British studio potter and writer on pottery.- Life and work :He was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He studied at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts and read history at King's College, Cambridge...

. She retired from the Central School in 1955.

She was President of the Arts and Crafts Society from 1940-1956 and was involved with the Crafts Centre at Hay Hill, where she was in charge of selecting the ceramics shown there. She was also involved with the Smithsonian touring Exhibition of British Artist Craftsmen in the 1950s.

Her book The Art of the Potter (1937), was the first book to relate contemporary craft practice to its historical context.

Since the 1990s there has been an increased interest in her influence on twentieth century British studio pottery
Studio pottery
Studio pottery is made by modern artists working alone or in small groups, producing unique items of pottery in small quantities, typically with all stages of manufacture carried out by one individual. Much studio pottery is tableware or cookware but an increasing number of studio potters produce...

.

External links

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