Meet the Yorkshire-based ceramicist using art to heal childhood trauma
There are easier ways to put pictures on pots, Makiko Hastings admits, as she takes scissors to the small square of newspaper in her hand and cuts a bird-shaped hole out of it.
"People ask me, 'Maki, why don't you just paint them?'" says the Yorkshire-based ceramicist, who will use the paper as a stencil for slip-decorating a stoneware cup with the shape of a bird carrying a sprig of foliage in its beak. "It's because I like bold, crispy edges. Painted lines are too blurry."
The cup belongs to Maki's Rakugaki collection – wheel-thrown blue-and-white cups, plates, platters, bowls, bud vases and candleholders named after the word for "doodle" or "scribble" in her native Japanese. Every piece is unique because the paper cutouts can be used only once. "I wet the newspaper until it sticks completely to the clay, so the slip doesn't breach the stencil," she says.
Maki picks up another cup on which the blue slip (liquid clay) has dried to tackiness. She gently peels off the paper, before scratching feather marks into the bird's wings and etching the word "Joy" into its body. "My decoration method is based on screen printing," continues Maki. "I wanted to create pottery that was more expressive, more creative, than everyday tableware."
In Maki's hands, however, everyday tableware is elevated, too. Her other style of pottery, Mazekoze, is a collection of hand-thrown stoneware in muted pastel shades that harmonise however they're combined (mazekoze means "jumble").
With their curvaceous forms and tactile semi-matte surfaces, these mugs, plates and fluted bowls are as elegant as they are utilitarian: "I'm not making things to sit on a shelf. I want them to be used and touched."
The birds, bunnies, flowers and foliage that feature alongside rainbows, stars and affirmative words on Maki's Rakugaki pieces aren't based on particular species; they are childlike forms that represent the nature that delights her in Knaresborough, North Yorkshire, where she lives with her second husband, Chris, and their 10-year-old daughter, Sabrina.
Here, she has found peace after a long healing process from the fallout of childhood trauma. Having surmounted multiple obstacles to realise her dream of becoming a potter, she is now using her craft to help others.
Maki doesn't remember seeing or hearing birds in the Tokyo suburb where she grew up alongside two brothers in a traditional patriarchal family. "My father wasn't interested in my achievements or opinions," she says. Though not academic at school, she loved art, design and photography. But her father's lack of interest fed a crippling insecurity rooted in a devastating experience. She had been assaulted by a stranger near her parents' home, aged six, and after she told her mother, it was never discussed again.
Maki has since received specialist therapy in the UK and Japan and is reconciled with her parents, but regaining a sense of balance and self-worth has taken decades. "The silence caused me to grow up with a sense of shame and unworthiness that meant, for a long time, I didn't even consider pursuing my dreams."
Maki's creative side lay dormant until her early twenties. While working in a bank, she attended evening classes at a nearby design school, handling clay for the first time on a visit to Mashiko, a town celebrated for its rustic pottery.
Encouraged by one of her tutors, Maki entered – and won – a magazine styling competition, then an Apprentice-style reality show for budding designers. This boost to her confidence and finances enabled her to head for London, where she worked in hospitality to fund her English studies.
When the inner voice urging her towards a more artistic path became too loud to ignore, Maki moved to North Yorkshire to study ceramics at Harrogate College. "It was completely spontaneous and irresponsible!" she says of the decision, inspired by memories of handling clay at Mashiko. The solace she'd always found in beautiful tableware also influenced her.
"When I was growing up, my mum prepared meals in the traditional Japanese way, presenting rice, pickles and miso soup in bowls and dishes that didn't match but created a harmonious setting. Mealtimes were my place of comfort."
Maki's career got off to a promising start when she met the potter David Constantine White; he would remain her friend and mentor until his death in 2011. She began work as his part-time assistant, commuting two hours each way from Harrogate to his studio in Mytholmroyd, West Yorkshire.
But her self-esteem and security was extinguished by a short, abusive first marriage and, after training as a social worker, she spent nearly a decade working in the care sector. She found her way back to clay via a job teaching pottery to young people with sight loss and other disabilities: "I loved helping the students express themselves through pottery."
Maki became a self-employed potter in 2017, moving last year into a purpose-built studio in the garden she shares with Chris (they married in 2006, after meeting at a karate class). Around the studio are Rakugaki pieces slip-decorated with affirmations – "I am enough"; "Keep going" – which help Maki tune in to the self-belief she's worked hard to rebuild. She began using words in her pottery during recovery from a deep depression triggered five years ago by memories of her childhood. Now she uses them as a tool to help others feel the healing powers of clay.
"When I started to express my feelings in my work, the positive reaction I had from customers made me realise how many people struggle to communicate their emotions," Maki says, explaining why she started her Kokoro Kobo ("heart studio") workshops.
She invites individuals and small groups to make and slip-decorate their own Rakugaki pieces alongside her, talking and sharing stories as they work: "I can't mend people, but maybe I can give them something they can take away that will make them smile."
Some people arrive at their own affirmations, but others are soothed by the touch of the clay itself. "Clay is from the earth, so manipulating it has always made me feel grounded," Maki says. "But for me, the magic is in its transformation, too. You start with a lump of mud and it can become anything."
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