Atrium Gallery

Now open

Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery has a large and fascinating ceramics collection representing many eras and design styles from the ground-breaking work of William Cookworthy and Plymouth Porcelain, to the Japanese inspired 20th Century studio pottery of Bernard Leach.

The ceramics collection is exhibited in the Atrium Gallery on our first floor balcony. Displays are designed to highlight different parts of our collections and rotate regularly to enable as many of our fantastic stored collections to be seen as possible.

The gallery has recently been refurbished. Explore our current displays here.

Contemporary Craft
This four sided case gives you a great opportunity to view some of the larger and more unusual parts of the collection - contemporary craft pieces. The case looks at how to describe contemporary craft - through media such as ceramics, glass, wood and textiles. It showcases many different artists and craftspeople in our collection both local and national such as Carole Rolfe, Caitlin Jenkins and Ann Sutton. It also contains four of our newest acquisitions; pieces by Bernard Leach, Hans Coper and Lucie Rie, donated by The Art Fund in 2008 (Donald Worth bequest).

Plymouth Porcelain, 1768 to 1770
Have you heard of Plymouth porcelain but are not sure why it is so special? This case explores how great William Cookworthy’s achievements were in founding the porcelain factory and how important it was for the South West. With a drawing of the factory’s kiln you can trace, step by step, how the porcelain was manufactured and also what problems the factory faced.

Plymouth Porcelain, Design and Experimentation, 1768 to 1770
This case looks more closely at the design styles and influences of Plymouth porcelain and shows off our fantastic collection. Have a look at the yellow ground butter dish - one of only two known examples of Plymouth porcelain in this colour - or the uniquely painted pair of pheasants. Animal models such as lions, cows and sheep produced at the factory are also on display.

Bristol Porcelain
When the Plymouth porcelain factory moved to Bristol in 1770, the factory progressed into a new era. This display looks at technical and stylistic developments made to the porcelain at the Bristol factory under the direction of Richard Champion.

Studio Pottery
This case explores the legacy of Studio Pottery in the South West, looking at concepts of form and texture. It highlights the local heritage of craft and pottery, showcasing works by artists such as Bernard Forrester, Ewen Henderson and Mary Rogers.

Containers
This case relates to the Key Stage 3 Art and Design units and may be useful for teachers and students.

Containers are practical everyday objects that we don’t often give much though to. Yet, most containers are designed specifically to suit a purpose. This case looks at a wide range of containers - from a 20th Century jewellery box to an 18th Century silver coffee pot, a German tankard to an English wine glass.

There are even some mystery objects for you to guess! Information about the mystery objects on display can be downloaded from the documents table below.

The Martin Brothers
The Martin Brothers were a group of four brothers working together in Fulham and Southall, London in the Victorian period. They produced many strange but wonderful ceramics in salt glazed stoneware. This case looks at the influence of nature on the Martin Brothers by putting their work side by side with items from the Natural History and Human History collections.

Chinoiserie
Chinoiserie was a key design style of the 1700s and was very fashionable. But what exactly is Chinoiserie and how can you recognise it? This case points out key features of the Chinoiserie style to help identify it. It gives examples of how Chinoiserie was used in ceramics, furniture and textiles and  presents some very fine pieces of porcelain and Delftware.

The Core
Our youth forum visited the museum’s decorative art stores to look at the collections and pick items that they found interesting. These items will be displayed next to their comments - transcripts of recorded discussions that took place about the items. The case is a real mix of items including a Chinese Buddha, a Slipware charger and a Hispano-Moresque vase.

Documents

To view these documents you might need to download some software. Visit our downloads page for more information.

	Containers: tobacco jar - information about this mystery object. File format Adobe Acrobat (pdf) - 147.3KB
	Containers: drug jar - information about this mystery object. File format Adobe Acrobat (pdf) - 169.8KB
	Containers: tulip vase - information about this mystery object. File format Adobe Acrobat (pdf) - 115.4KB
	Containers: reliquary - information about this mystery object. File format Adobe Acrobat (pdf) - 152.2KB

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