John Crawford (potter)
John Crawford (1951 – 3 February 2012) was a New Zealand potter who was born on, and maintained a studio on, the West Coast of New Zealand. Life 
Crawford was born in Runanga in 1951. He attended Greymouth High School, where he met Yvonne Rust, who was the art teacher at that time. She encouraged him to train under Jack Laird at Waimea Craft Pottery in Nelson. From 1969 to 1974 he was trained as a potter at Waimea. In this studio workshop, run the style of Bernard Leach, he learned to use a wheel, glazing, and firing. In 1974 he set up a studio in Ngakawau, a small settlement 30 km north of Westport. Hector Pottery was operated collaboratively by John and his wife Anne, who had also done her training at Waimea Craft Pottery. Artistic career 
Crawford's work encompassed three areas: wheel-thrown functional earthenware, figurative sculptural pieces, and works on paper; he considered these were interdependent, with representations from his drawings finding their way into his sculptures. In 1986 Crawford was the New Zealand guest potter at the first National Australian Ceramics Symposium in Canberra. He was a committee member of the New Zealand Society of Potters, and president from 1985 to 1988. In 1989, with the help of a Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council grant, Crawford prepared a solo exhibition at the Suter Art Gallery in Nelson. He fired thousands of porcelain pebbles, 30 mm across and 10 mm thick, painted, numbered, and arranged in 2 x 1.5 m area. Collections 
Crawford's work is in the collection of the Suter Art Gallery, the Southland Museum and Art Gallery in Invercargill, and the Auckland Institute and Museum's Auckland Studio Potters Collection. Pieces are also owned by the NZ Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Paris, the Myer Foundation in Australia, and New Zealand's Korean Embassy. Exhibitions 

 1974: Suter Art Gallery
 The Bowl. 1981: Crafts Council of New Zealand, Wellington
 1983: World Crafts Exhibition, Canada
 Winstone Ties That Bind. 1985: Crafts Council of New Zealand, Wellington
 New Zealand Potters. 1986: Gallery Eight, La Jolla, California
 Ceramics '86. 1986: Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, New Plymouth
 Spheres. 1986: New Zealand Society of Potters, Southland Museum, Invercargill
 1989: Suter Art Gallery

References

External links 

 Hector Pottery

1951 births
20th-century New Zealand artists
21st-century New Zealand artists
New Zealand potters
2012 deaths
People from the West Coast, New Zealand
Artists from the West Coast, New Zealand