The latest display by Clink Street Ceramics is titled Rave Culture Theory and will run from January through to Spring 2025. The display explores the origins of rave culture in the UK and USA in the early 1990s. Rave Culture in the UK owes so much to Clink Street, the birthplace of some the country’s first Acid House Raves in 1988.

The precursor of raves were the warehouse parties across London in the late 80s. The early 1990s saw an explosion in electronic music, and in order to obtain an amplified sense of unity, the venues needed to grow. Capitalising on a lack of police powers at the time, promoters developed complicated solutions to seek out disused secret locations in derelict buildings, and even open outdoor spaces, to create large venues as a home to the emerging music scene.

This new series of work explores this theme through a series of Stoneware vases, celebrating discarded flyers, images, and memories. Each piece is hand thrown on a traditional potters wheel by studio potter James Sims, and fired to 1,220°C. It is then glazed and fired again, before transfers are added, and fired for a third time.

Discovered through archival research, a series of ceramic transfers are used to share experiences, examining the imagery of the early days of rave culture both in the UK and USA.

Photo Credit: David Wilman Photography