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Alumnus and professional photographer Phil Crow has launched a nationally recognised photographic exhibition about the last bottle kilns of the Potteries.
FORTYSEVEN: The last bottle ovens and kilns of The Potteries has been featured by the Guardian and showcases the 47 remaining bottle ovens and kilns spread across 27 locations across the Potteries. Celebrating the heritage of the Potteries, former pupil Phil shows the dark beauty of a bygone industry juxtaposed with photographs by Ernest Warrillow MBE, another former pupil, that depict the thriving pottery industry back in its heyday.
The exhibition which launched at Keele University in April, is now in its second phase at Gladstone Pottery and is on display in the Great Pottery Throwdown Room until the end of July. The exhibition will then enter its final stage and will be on display at Middleport Pottery, actually inside their bottle oven, from 18th August until 17th September. As well as the main exhibition, one of the pictures from the show was chosen and is currently on display in London at The Royal Academy of Art’s prestigious Summer Exhibition.
Phil, now a professional photographer based in Lincoln, was inspired to bring the exhibition to life based on his family’s own roots within the Pottery industry and wanted to bring the past and present together to celebrate the industrial heritage of Stoke-on-Trent and its surrounding towns.
Both Phil and Ernest attended NULS (formerly known as Newcastle High School) at different times and have credited their time at school for sparking their love of photography. Photography at NULS remains a highly popular part of the extended curriculum for Sixth Formers where students have the opportunity to create personalised projects. With a specialised photography studio and the opportunity to visit locations near and far, pupils today also develop a lasting love for photography as well as outstanding results at AS Level.
Speaking of the exhibition, Phil commented: “I wanted to show the beauty in their shape and how they interact with the buildings that now surround them. Is there a place for them in modern society? The answer has to be yes! This photographic record will provide a historic visual journey of the remaining sites through a contemporary lens, an archive of their current state and a reminder to all of the importance of the industry to the area in the same way that photographers before me- such as Warrillow- have documented them as working buildings.”
You can discover more about the exhibition on Phil’s website at www.philcrow.com/fortyseven/
And the Warrillow Archive is part of Keele University’s Special Collections with more information available at https://www.keele.ac.uk/library/specialcollections/warrillowcollection/
Louis Bond: “The site of the camp was much larger than I had ever expected. Much of the camp was destroyed, but there were the cabin like structures at the front of the complex which were tiny in comparison to the number of people who were forced to stay in them. At the rear of the
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