Anna Kathrine Mæhlum Dypsjø Egan

I am a ceramicist with a master's in product design who loves to play with clay. One of my earliest childhood memories is trying to create something from the wet earth on a rainy day, and most of my interaction with the materiality of clay is still driven by a similar sense of joy and childlike curiosity. With my work, I wish to create products that celebrate everyday aesthetics. Consequently, I create useful products where the making process balances using digital technology and traditional crafting techniques to create objects with unique qualities.

Q&A

What craft do you work with?

I was introduced to working with clay a few times growing up, and it was always memorable. However, it was only when I started my bachelor’s education at OsloMet that I was given the opportunity to learn how to work with clay. I have worked with ceramics for seven years, and my practice is known to be driven by experimentation and curiosity. Perhaps that is why my favorite technique is the one I haven’t learned yet.

What inspires you to work with this craft?

I find the material itself to be inspiring. Clay is an interesting material because it can radically change its core characteristics in response to its environment. If the clay is placed in a humid environment, it will be soft, malleable, and flexible. The clay will also become dry if it’s in a dry environment. Its colors will become dull and matted. The clay body will become lighter but also harder and more brittle. If you strike the clay in its dry form, it will not absorb the blow like plastic clay. It will crack and break. The clay can shift between wet, soft, leather-hard, and dry stages in an endless cycle. Each stage of the clay’s spectrum of stages is reversible. That is until it stops being clay and becomes ceramic. When Clay is inflicted with heat in the range of 900-1000 degrees Celsius, called a bisque fire, the clay will become pottery. It will be hard but brittle and porous at this stage since this temperature range starts the vitrification process that strengthens the ceramic body. At this stage, the ceramic object can absorb and release water. However, it will not be able to hold water. Clay that’s fired to a higher temperature of 1220-1300 degrees Celsius, depending on the clay`s intrinsic qualities and component parts, can fully vitrify. At this stage, the ceramics have obtained a stage of permanence. With clay, you can create an object with a life expectancy that has the potential to far outlasts our own. A thing that, in addition to its intrinsic utility, also can carry our cultural heritage into a future that we won’t be around to see.

How do you start your creative process?

How I conduct a process and how it starts will vary. I don’t work to a set formula. It can simply be that I am confronted with something that I find inspiring. An idea that I want to materialize. It can be an exploration into material or form that is ment to solve a spesific problem or maybe I just want to test out a new technique and the product will grow from there.

How would you best describe your workspace and what tools could you not do without?

I am lucky to have a private workspace at home and a shared workshop with a larger facility. These spaces offer a work environment that is helpful in different ways. The shared space is better stocked and offers cutting-edge technology; more importantly, it has people. Practitioners like me with experience who share a sense of community. On the other hand, my home workspace offers solitude and a sense of calm. This space is mine and I can stay as long as I want. In truth, I think I could work with clay anywhere, just like I did when I was a kid, sitting in a puddle on a rainy day. However, I would still need a kiln. Otherwise, it will just stay clay.

Are there new techniques you would like to try?

Yes. All of them, please. Ceramics is a fascinating field because there is always something new to learn. To highlight one specific technique seems arbitrary when there is a world of discovery available. I am currently exploring how 3D printing in plastic and clay can be combined with hand-building and other traditional crafting techniques. In a material exploration like this, new techniques are born through the use of intuition and getting to know the material.