Bowl, stoneware with ash glaze, 'Picket fence bowl', Richard Slee, made at Dan Arbeid's studio in Wendens Ambo, Essex, 1971.

Stoneware bowl on a high foot, the rim topped with a picket fence. The bowl press-moulded, the rest handbuilt. The interior decorated with an ash glaze, and the piece reduction fired. The piece has a large shallow chip and other minor non-structural damage on the exterior.

This bowl was acquired by the Museum in 2011 for display in the V&A exhibition: Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970-1990. At the time of its acquisition, Richard Slee made the following observations about the bowl:
This is one of a short series, probably 4 pieces, using the rim of the bowl as a 'containment', The others I remember used Trees, a garden wall, and one with Doors in the way that building sites were fenced off in those days. I think that picket fence piece was the most successful of the series. The materials, clay, glaze were those at hand in Dan's Studio, so now look strange as compared to later work They [the series of bowls] owe more to Pop Art than Studio Pottery, at that time I doubt I would have known or understood the term Postmodernism.
(Email from Richard Slee, 1 Feb 2011; V&A Registered File 2010/931).

Made at Dan Arbeid's studio, Wendens Ambo, in the summer of 1971. At the time of the bowl's acquisition in 2011, Richard Slee commented: 'I rarely named pieces then, but 'Picket fence bowl' would be best if using a title.'

C.1-2011