Manukau Libraries Central Research Library

ORAL HISTORY COLLECTION

MNP OH 7: Peter Stichbury

Interview with Peter Stichbury, potter.

Interviewed by Bruce Ringer at on 2 June 2004.

Ca. 55 minutes

Manukau Research Library Oral History Collection

MNP OH 7

Interview with Peter Stichbury, potter. Interviewed by Bruce Ringer, Manurewa, 2 June 2004.

Some minor editing of the transcription has been undertaken for purposes of clarity. Square brackets are used to indicate omissions, insertions and clarifications. The notes in the right hand column have been added after the original interview, using information from: a conversation with Peter Stichbury on 25/6/04 (PS); notes added by Peter Stichbury on reading the transcript (PSE); the commentary in Peter Stichbury Potter [videorecording], 1981 (PSP); the text to the exhibition, 'Peter Stichbury: A Survey', 2004 (PSS); and various published sources. The photographs were taken by Bruce Ringer on 25 June 2004, unless otherwise indicated.

TAPE ONE, SIDE A

BR [This is an interview with Peter Stichbury, potter, of Manurewa.] Interviewer Bruce Ringer, 2 June 2004. We’ll start with your life, Mr Stichbury. When did you come to Manurewa and where did you come from?

PS Well, I was born in of course [and] lived in Mt Eden until I *27 (PSE). was about 25 [or] 28*. After a succession of different experiences in **First as a signalman in the Territorials, then in life – Army**, working as a office boy*** before that – I finally got Divisional Signals ('Div. enough exams to go to Auckland Teachers’ College, which was broken Sig.'), finally with the up by war service; and I was chosen to do a third year, another year, on Army Pay Office (PS). top of the two years which was the normal time to do an art specialist course. ***Briefly with the Martha Gold Mining Company, then with the Express Company (PS).

2 Then while I was at Teachers College I made one pot with a man call Hilary Clarke, who used to operate the clay department of the art course, and from there I went to an evening class while I was an itinerant art specialist after leaving Teachers’ College. I was an art specialist for 2 ½ years.

And I went to Avondale College with a potter-teacher called Robert *Robert Nettleton Field Field*, and made […] pots and had them salt-glazed at Crum Brick**. (1899-1987) taught night classes in pottery at Then I was appointed – I applied for – a position at Ardmore Teachers’ Avondale College during College, and was appointed Assistant Lecturer in Art, July 1951. the 1940s. Field, a sculptor, studied pottery at Camberwell School of Art during the 1930s, and on his return to New Zealand in 1935 took up the teaching of pottery. The young Len Castle attended Field's classes at the same time as Peter Stichbury.

**'Crum Brick' i.e. Crum Brick Tile & Pottery Co. Ltd, established by Albert Crum and sons in Portage Road, New Lynn, in 1929. Crum had in earlier years established the New Zealand Brick, Tile & Pottery Co. Ltd, taken over by Amalgamated Brick & Pipe Co. Ltd in 1927. Sources: Gail Henry, New Zealand Pottery: Commercial and Collectible, new ed., Auckland, 1999; Dick Scott, Fire on the Clay, Auckland, 1979.

I found an embryonic pottery with two wheels which were completely hopeless - nothing else - and from that stage I built it up into a very 25 successful pottery section of the art department.

In 1957, through the fact that I had been teaching and potting for those *Fellowship of the times I was living at Ardmore College, of course (which was a Association of New Zealand Arts Societies, residential college) - and my wife [Diane] and I had been married […] funded by the Department in 1956, and she was part-time librarian for a while - I applied for a of Internal Affairs (PSE). scholarship to go overseas run by the Association of New Zealand Art Societies.*

The scholarship enabled me to go to Bernard Leach in St Ives, the well- *Bernard Leach (1887– known potter, and to Michael Cardew, another very well-known potter, 1979), British potter, founder of pottery studio who was pottery training officer at Abuja in Nigeria.* movement in 1920s, author of the classic text, A Potter’s Book (1940) etc. Michael Cardew (1901– 1983), Leach's first pupil, author of Pioneer Pottery, etc. "The writings of

3 Bernard Leach and Michael Cardew were the early inspirational forces for potters in both New Zealand and Australia, inspiring them with a belief that a life of dignity and fulfilment could be had from working with one's heart, head and hands, making ceramic art accessible, bringing objects of beauty to all, while providing a satisfying livelihood for the potter …", Janet Mansfield, Contemporary Ceramic Art in Australia and New Zealand, Roseville East, Aus., 1995, p. 12. Leach visited New Zealand in 1962; Cardew in 1968 and 1981. On Cardew's first visit, he stayed with the Stichburys in Manurewa for six weeks, potted, and held a week- long pottery school. The pots Cardew made during this period were fired by Peter Stichbury and Neil Grant over one weekend in the oil-fired kilns at Manurewa and Ardmore, and sent to the Pan Pacific Arts Festival, where Cardew was guest exhibitor (PSE). We were there at Leach for six months, and I was able to develop my throwing skills there, […] mainly with the help of Bill Marshall, the foreman. Bernard was 70 at the time and he was a bit distracted, I think, by other events in his life. So I didn’t see a lot of him, although we did have some good discussions; Bill Marshall, the foreman, was the leading light as far as I was concerned.

Then we travelled around Europe for a couple of months and saw potters, and potteries, and exhibitions, at museums, and climbed many stairs of the steeples of the churches and such-like, and had a wonderful time visiting the Van Gogh collection in Amsterdam, which was one of 50 the highlights.

Then we flew to Nigeria eventually, and it was just magic! Cardew treated me as an equal, so that I could make anything that I wanted. He wasn’t concerned about teaching me anything, because I could throw at that stage […] that was a very exciting and rewarding experience, and it has really influenced both Diane and I all through our lives.

4 It was a humbling experience, because you went to villages where *"Imagine working in a women made pots with huge skill.* And up at a place called Sokoto, for pottery made of mud huts with thatched roofs. The instance, there was a colony of potters where men made and fired pots indigenous pottery was and the skill of these people was just amazing. They’d been doing it tremendous …" (PSP). since Neolithic times, of course.

BR What was Cardew doing there?

PS He was appointed – Cardew had a wonderful experience - I could go on *Winchcombe Pottery, for hours about this, of course, but … He worked with Bernard Leach in near Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. Cardew the 1920’s and set up or re-established an old pottery at Winchcombe, was there 1926-1939. which didn’t work properly, because he was trying to revive English country pottery and people weren’t really interested in it.* And he wanted to sell them very cheaply, so that people could take advantage of this.

But that didn’t work, then he went to Ghana,* and followed another *Specifically, to Achimota potter there called Harry Davis who was a famous potter [who] came to College, as part of a British Government initiative to New Zealand in 1962 and set up here. Then from there – that didn’t establish a commercial work – it was during the war, and they over … tried to get him to do too pottery industry and supply much, so that just collapsed after the war. pottery throughout West Africa. Then he saw an advertisement in the Times for a pottery training officer *Cardew was appointed wanted in Nigeria so they could set up small potteries around the Pottery Officer in the Nigerian Department of country and establish a new industry.* And of course he was paid this Trade & Industry in 1950. time so he was in seventh heaven […] He established this fabulous He worked in Abuja, first pottery – mud huts - and … there he is…[PS reaches forward and for the British Government shows…] and after independence for the Nigerian Government, until his retirement in 1966. BR … a photo of Cardew in a Nigerian village* surrounded by villagers *That is, at the Abuja with the raw materials. Pottery Centre, the 'raw materials' being clay (PSE). PS These people [were] Gwari. He used to send the boys out to a clay-site which he discovered, and they would dig it [the clay] and the women would bring it back in calabashes, and he’d pay them with either a shilling or a ten pence depending on the size of the calabash … The kiln sheds [are] in the background there.

BR That’s a kiln shed, is it?

PS This is his pottery set up.

BR It is a wonderful form in itself, the building.

PS Beautiful! So this is the atmosphere I was working in. And we traveled *See: Peter Stichbury, 'The around Nigeria quite extensively. It’s a huge country, twice the size of Abuja Scene, New Zealand Potter, 2:2, December France. So we were there for nearly nine months*, then came back 1959, pp. 19-28; 'Hausa here, and I was appointed a full lecturer** just after returning to a brand Pottery', New Zealand new pottery that the principal had asked me to design before I went Potter, 3:1, August 1960, away. pp. 27-34. An exhibition of Peter Stichbury's work, 'Pottery Made in Nigeria', was held at the Willeston

5 Galleries, Wellington, 17- 27 November, 1959.

**From 1960, heading a new pottery department.

I built a big round kiln and had some wonderful students. When *Peter Stichbury left Ardmore was to close in 1974, I could have gone to another teachers’ Ardmore at the end of 1969 college, but I decided to take up pottery fulltime, and haven’t regretted it (PS). at all.*

BR So you’ve made your living from pottery ever since?

PS Yeah.

BR Has it been hard?

PS Well it was in the middle of a boom, really, when I started. People used to ring up and say, I’ve just opened a gallery can you supply me with pots? And I couldn’t always do that. 100 […] I had two special outlets - or three really- here in Auckland and many in the country. ‘New Vision’ Have you heard of that?

BR Yes, I remember it.

PS ‘Art of the Potter’.* *This had outlets in Victoria St. West, Auckland, and Hurstmere Rd, .

BR I don’t recall it.

PS Brenner Associates*; and ‘Karl’s’ in St Heliers. *Brenner Associates, New Zealand's first modern design store, est. 1950.

BR No, I don’t know that.

PS People used to drive up with car seats out, and fill up the car, and take them away, and pay me on the spot. But it’s gradually shelved, it’s gradually gone down hill.

BR Has it, in what, in terms of return?

PS In terms of demand. Galleries have closed down. A different *Albany Village Pottery generation of people, I think. I was invited to join Albany Village Gallery, est. 1975. Pottery in 1981.*

That was a main source of income for a long time. But fashions change, and everybody wants colour now, and it comes in by the ton-load now from overseas.

BR So are there fewer potters making a living?

6 PS Oh, yes, very few now. They said there was up to 40,000 people potting *Others included Brenon […] It’s a lot of people. I can't really believe that. There are some Adams, Jan Cockell, Barry and Barbara Hockenhull, people still making a living, but Albany Village Pottery just faded away Peter Lange, Renton and we sold it. There was a group of fifteen of us running it as a co- Murray, Rosie Murray, op.* We sold it about three years ago [to] one of the potters who has Peter Oxborough, Cecilia since given it up as a pottery – and it’s now a café. Parkinson, Heather Skeats, Margaret Symes, Robyn Stewart, Andrew Van De Putten, Howard Williams, Merilyn Wiseman (PS; PSE).

BR I understand you used to hold at least annual exhibitions here?

PS Yes. One of the main sources of income too, was to have open *The first open day was weekends – open days as we called them in the first instance – but when held on 11 December 1971, the last open weekend on Saturday trading came in again we had two days. […] we’ve done that 29-30 November 2003. No for 30 years.* open weekend was held in 2001 (PS). You know, we’d have queues at my workshop trying to buy pots in the early days, and we’ve done very well out of that. It’s been very good.

BR I understand you held the last one recently?

PS Yeah [2003].

BR Are you still actually potting at all?

PS Not at the moment. I’m a bit reluctant to go into the workshop now, but I will do, just quietly. I want to get back to making cellos, because I do that as a hobby.

BR Have you done that for long?

PS Since about 1980. I’ve made three cellos and three violas, mainly for my daughters.

BR Who do they play for?

PS My oldest daughter, Philippa, and my second daughter, Rebecca*, *Peter’s first cello was played for St Matthew’s Orchestra, and Rebecca and Catherine, my completed for Rebecca in 1985 (PSS). Peter once youngest daughter, both played for the Auckland Youth Orchestra. noted that he himself "has a They traveled overseas to different areas - Australia and Hawaii and bash at the clarinet" Canada - with their instruments. ('Pottery a Way of Life …', South Auckland Times, 4/10/78, p. 10).

BR Well, it must be immensely satisfying to see your daughters playing instruments you’ve made yourself.

PS Yes. They’re all too busy now, of course. One of them, Catherine, has got two kids, so …

BR And, the pots that are around the walls, are these ones that you’ve kept as your favourites? The plates and pots?

7

PS Some of them, yes. But they’re in at exhibition of course at the moment, you know about that, do you?

BR No, I don’t actually …

PS The museum invited me about six months ago to have a retrospective, so you have to go and see that [laughter]. 150

BR I must, yes, indeed […] When is it on until?

PS 8 August. It opened on the 27th [May].* *’Peter Stichbury, A Survey of a New Zealand Studio Potter” Auckland War Memorial Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira, 26 May – 8 August 2004. See also: 'A Tribute to the Founding Father of New Zealand Pottery', Manukau Courier, 10/6/04, pp. 6-7.

BR Going right back to the very first time that you – as it were – decided to become a potter: why pottery rather than painting or something else?

PS Well, I’d been through the gamut of painting and drawing and *"I like the word modelling, a bit of carving at teachers college, and bookbinding and all craftsman. It speaks of sorts of things we had to do for teaching purposes. And I wasn’t a good skill; also love for the material used. The word painter, but I was always searching for something, and I loved working craftsman implies more with wood. But when clay came along it was just the ideal form of than technical skill, expression* – wonderful! And I became fairly skilled pretty soon however - perhaps one afterwards, so that […] I had that scholarship which put me on my feet, should say artist-craftsman and I was able to pot in weekends and things while I was still teaching at …" (PSP). college.

We moved here because I felt that the college equipment was for the students, not for me; and it was a residential college, of course, so they had after-hours to work with.

I tried to build a studio at the home we lived in at Ardmore, but that didn’t work, so we searched for this and found this, which was the best thing we ever did in terms of housing and space.

BR ‘This’ being 95 Great South Road, Manurewa

PS No, 94B.

BR 94B, I beg your pardon!

PS Three quarters of an acre.

8

BR A wonderful section backed - backing - on bush.

PS Bush reserve.

BR What was there when you came?

9 PS This, this room was two bedrooms and a bathroom actually. And there was none of this … [PS gestures to living room and surrounding linked rooms]

The Stichbury's future house as it appeared from the Great South Road, mid-1940s (Manurewa Historical Society)

[We] absolutely gutted the home with a brilliant young builder who was a potter for a while. I did all the smashing up and he did all the building. [Laughter].

And we lived in the home with corrugated iron round here, and tom-cat coming in and spraying, and the bed there in the dining room, with the fridge one side and the stove the other sort of thing … It was over about a year… but it’s all been worth it.

BR So you’ve been here 40 years?

PS Yes, since 1963.

BR Well, it’s certainly a wonderful place

PS Yes, we’ve planted so many trees. There’s eight pohutakawas that were planted; many others. It was fairly barren because the old boy that had it was a sheep farmer and he had about six sheep roaming around. […] He left us a ewe and lamb, and Diane would ring me up at College and say: “the sheep are out again!” They’d be trotting down Great South Road and I’d just have to come and grab the lamb, put a rope around its neck, and its mother would follow behind…

10

BR […] 1963 was really the - well, early in the - massive urban 200 development of Manurewa.

PS Yes, behind us was just farming. Well you can see it now […] it’s just *Subdivision of the former covered with Hill Park.* It was all grass up in the area straight behind. Nathan Estate off Hill Road, Manurewa was first proposed in 1959. The first sections, off Grand Vue Road, went on the market on 2 December 1961. […] the chap that built the house built the main workshop, and I built the garage and the glazing room [beside] it as well. [I] pulled down terrible old buildings that were around, sheds that you would just push over, you know, full of borer.

I pushed one over and the old farmer that we brought it from came round and he said: “Oh, you’ve pushed your shed down." He said: "Oh, well, it’s your place now! Do what you like!”

BR Have you taken part in Manurewa Potters’ Club?* *Founded October 1974.

PS Oh, yes […] I didn’t become a member of it because I was so busy *Auckland Studio Potters involved in everything else, I didn’t want … I was president of the Society, founded March [Auckland] Studio Potters and president of the New Zealand Society and 1961. Peter Stichbury was a foundation committee on their committees for about twelve years, and it was more expansive member and was President than being a local one.* But they regarded me as a mentor to a degree 1966-9. See also Pam in that they’d come around to get help and I used to run courses, ten-day Robinson and Tui Morse, courses, in the workshop. They came from and Papakura Auckland Studio Potters: and it was very, very interesting.** The First 25 Years, Auckland, 1986. New Zealand Society of Potters, formed October 1963. Peter Stichbury was a foundation member and was elected President in 1973. See also Helen Mason, 10 Years of Pottery

11 in New Zealand, Auckland, 1967 (special issue of New Zealand Potter). Peter Stichbury has exhibited work in most of the New Zealand Society of Potters annual exhibitions from 1957 onwards, and most of the Auckland Studio Potters annual exhibitions from the Auckland Provincial Potters Exhibition, Auckland War Memorial Museum, 1961, onwards.

** Peter Stichbury was also guest exhibitor at the Manukau Festival Exhibition of Arts and Crafts, September 1971 ('Pottery Exhibition', South Auckland Gazette, 7/9/71, p. 4).

BR So [who were] some the more notable potters whom you taught?

PS Carrick Oliver was one of my more notable students at Ardmore. He *Carrick Oliver’s farm at took up potting for a number of years.* I've got to know all the potters, Drury was the scene of kiln demonstrations and kiln- of course, here, but a lot of them have just disappeared […] Merle building exercises for the Brindlestone, she’s still up Redoubt Road* … Quite a number – Auckland Studio Potters forgotten their names. It’s a long time ago. during the 1970s. **should be: "she lived in Redoubt Road" (PSE).

BR It was a fairly active club as I understand.

PS Oh, very active, yes. They all had their own kilns – the late Marjory Leighton, she had her own kiln. People down at Weymouth had their own kiln. It was very active, very active indeed. It was good.

I built a big oil kiln at home, which I’ve since pulled down because I’ve turned to gas. I’ve been firing with gas now for about 17 years. The oil kiln was great, and I had a big oil kiln at Ardmore, so I could use both of them.

Yes, I’d like to be able to know the names of some of them. I met one of the potters at the opening of the exhibition the other day and I couldn’t think of her name. Very tiny woman. Have you met any?

BR I think I might [inaudible] a few people, here and there, but …

PS And Derek Williams across the road is still a member. There's only about six there. Have you met up with him?

BR No, I haven’t

12 PS He could tell you a bit.

BR Derek Williams?

PS Yes, straight opposite us.

BR I’ll take that name down. Yes, from what I understand there was some *Adult education classes pottery activity as early as 1960 in this town. Anthony Stones came were held at the newly- opened Manurewa High down and tutored.* School from 1960 onwards. See: ‘Manurewa Mud Makes Vases’ Ribbon News-Pictorial: 5/10/60, p.1

PS Anthony Stones?* *Anthony Stones (b. 1934) was to become a well- known sculptor. His later commissions included Lord Freyberg (1981) and Jean Batten (1989), the latter statue standing outside the international terminal at Auckland International Airport, .

BR Yes, the name surprised me […] that must have been quite early in his career.

PS Anthony Stones. I don’t recall him at all. Still, that must be me.

BR Well that was before you came to Manurewa – just before – 1960.

PS Yes, of course. But they used to come to Ardmore, some of them, *" I had tremendous because I took schools at Ardmore and evening classes at Ardmore, and students …" (PSP). weekend classes.* So I’ve done a lot of teaching, which I enjoy very much – still teaching.

BR You still teach?

PS I still teach one day a week on a Thursday, for three hours at the *The Studio opened a Auckland Studio Potters Centre,* . It started out as teaching Crafts Centre in Onehunga advanced pupils, but I take beginners sometimes… It’s been very in September 1975. exciting, very good.

And Diane of course, she was … we were in partnership. A business *"Diane and I are full partnership* until we realized we were paying too much GST and doing partners in the pottery …" two tax returns! [Laughter.] So that we abandoned that. (PSP)

[…] She made platters, pressed moulded platters and moulded plates over a form all the time, as well, just as a different means of expression and variety. So she’s been a real wonderful person to have as well being a wife, and a potter as well.

The three kids all joined in making stuff.* Catherine made all those *"Our three girls have figures [up there …] Until she was twelve she made beautiful little thrived in our particular figures out of rolled clay – carpenters and pilots and twins and all sorts environment and are a very

13 of things – and actually sold one to the Governor General’s wife at an happy bunch of children. exhibition in Wellington. They're creative. They come out to the pottery and make clay things and they're interested in the firing. They make music of all different sorts …" Peter Stichbury, quoted in Doreen Blumhardt, New Zealand Potters: Their Work and Words, Reed, 1976, p. 71.

BR You said until she was twelve …

PS Yeah – then she just finished. But she has got two children now. And * Philippa Stichbury- Philippa my eldest daughter’s a very well known art teacher.* She’s Cooper. had art books printed, and she paints – that last one’s fallen down [gestures to triptych on wall], illustrates books and teaches at Dio.** **Diocesan School for Girls, Epsom. Philippa had Teaches art and general class – loves it! And she was in demand for also taught at Conifer 300 three years teaching to groups of teachers around this area and as far as Grove Primary School, Whangarei and Hamilton. .

BR So there’s something in the genes?

PS Yeah, must be! She’s a better artist than I am.

BR What are there… would you say are the highlights of your own career?

PS Getting married [laughter] to Diane; having three children, wonderful ** 'Pottery a Way of Life girls who are very close*; and Ardmore, becoming a lecturer at for Peter Stichbury and Family', South Auckland Ardmore for nearly 18 years; and going to Cardew and Leach – more so Times, 4/10/78, pp. 8, 10; Cardew than Leach. 'The Stichburys: Pottering About in Manurewa', Manukau Courier, 9/8/88, p. 2.

BR Would you say any New Zealand potters have influenced your work strongly?

PS No. Other way around!* [Laughter]. I had to, really, well I didn’t want * "Influences on a potter's really to do any of this crazy creative stuff they call [inaudible]. To work are very indirect - as much a feeling or make a living you had to be very disciplined. No holiday pay, no philosophy as a technique; holidays that you could take for any length of time, when you compare and one's personal style it to the 13 weeks of a teacher's life. When I could use that time to evolves unconsciously throw, and to travel around of course. from hundreds of such influences …" (PSP). A tour of the States in 1986*, meeting up with potters, other potters in *Arranged by a contact of the world – very interesting. There’s quite camaraderie of potters. Harry Davis, Paul Meyers, an American potter who taught at Cerra Coso College, Ridgecrest, California.

And in 2001 Diane and I went to Wales where I gave a talk at the *The Michael Cardew Aberystwth Art Department – University Art Department – amongst Centenary Symposium, University of Wales, others, on the hundredth anniversary of Michael Cardew’s birth. It was Aberystwyth, U.K., 27-28

14 called an academic symposium on Michael Cardew, to celebrate the June, 2001. Peter hundredth anniversary of his birth*. So it's been good. Stichbury's contribution was published in Interpreting Ceramics, Issue 3, 2002 (www.researchingceramics. net). Been to Fiji […] we went ahead in 1986 - 1968, rather, a group of us *Organized by Bruce went to Fiji*, and I went ahead and set up an exhibition. We stayed Palmer, Director of the Fiji Museum, who invited New there for ten days and filmed […Fijian…] potters at work. So it’s all Zealand potters to exhibit been great – very exciting. (PS).

350 I’d do it all over again.

BR [… ] Is there any time you’ve thought it would all be easier to have a steady job – that is, since you became full time?

PS Well, I discussed this with Diane, I said, you know, I could have been earning $80,000 a year instead of about thirty [$30,000] odd if I’d gone to another [Training] College and potted as well. But we’ve never really been interested in making a lot of money. It’s the lifestyle that’s been important.

But you have to be disciplined. You can’t take a lot of time off.

BR Yes, you said no holidays…

PS Oh we had holidays, sure we did. We used to have baches down at Orere and up at Whangaparaoa lent to us and trips around the South Island and a trip to Fiji (two of the girls came with us) […] We’ve done pretty well.

BR So what would a working day …?

PS A working day? Start about 9 o’clock. Sometimes go to 6 o’clock. There’s a lot to do.

I fought with the tax revolt against – do you now about that?

BR The tax revolt? No I don’t.

PS In 1979 they brought - the National Party brought - in tax on pottery and caravans and yachts.

BR I remember the tax on yachts. I hadn’t realized it was on pottery as well.

PS Oh, yes! A huge fight. And we won!

BR Good on you! It was one of Muldoon’s?

PS One of Muldoon’s crazy ideas, with Templeton.* They wanted to put *R.H. Muldoon, Prime 40% on decorative ware and 10% on domestic ware, you see. So that Minister, 1975 -1984, and Hugh Templeton, Ministry was really very funny! We used to bamboozle them and ask them if a of Customs, 1978-1982. vase was a piece of domestic ware or artistic ware – and they hadn’t a On 16 May 1979

15 clue. And we brought in pots from [inaudible] to see what they knew Templeton announced the about that. We had two Customs officers arrive on the doorsteps to Government's intention to levy sales tax on a number interview Diane, of all things, you know. I was the chief protagonist in of previously untaxed the scene. items, including household goods (10%) caravans (20%) and boats (20%) (‘Govt’s Sales Tax Bombshell’, New Zealand Herald, 17/5/79, p.1). ‘Household goods’ were defined to include whiteware and tableware, thus bringing under the Sales Tax Act a number of staple items produced by potters. In fact the previous (Labour) Government had lifted the existing sales tax on ornamental ceramic ware from 20% to 40% in May 1975 (Customs Act Amendment Act 1975, 5.6). Muldoon's administration inherited this measure in October, and Templeton's initiative simply increased the difficulty of distinguishing between domestic and ornamental ware. However, in the political climate of the time, it was the Muldoon administration that received all the blame.

BR Were you the inspirer of the revolt?

PS Oh, it just all came together like that.* We had a huge meeting in the *An organization called Town Hall, and Trevor Bayliss, who was Curator of Fine Arts** at the Crafts Against Sales Tax was formed. Museum gave a wonderful talk, and people wrote articles in the paper. The public was on our side, and they just backed down. It was **Appointed Curator of wonderful! Democracy at work. Applied Arts in 1964

BR How long did that take out of your…?

PS Quite a few years – not years, months – and I reckon I lost about $5000 that year. Used to wake up in the middle of the night [inaudible]. Used to get letters from Muldoon saying, “Dear Stichbury” [laughter]. Should have written back saying, “Dear Muldoon”!

They weren’t going to give in, but they suddenly just backed down*. * From 2 November 1979 The idea of tax inspectors going around the Coromandel trying to find craftspeople with earnings of less than $50,000 per the potters hidden in the bush around around … down at Waihi and all year (i.e. the majority) around the place – it’d be a nightmare! were exempted from the tax ( Sales Tax Exemption from Licensing Notice, 1979).

16 BR Not such a bad job, perhaps. [Laughter.]

PS How [are] we going?

BR This tape is almost coming to an end on this side. I'll stop it there.

PS Been a bit disjointed… 424

TAPE ONE: SIDE B

BR [Let’s return to] the working day of the potter.

PS Well there’s so much to do. When we did this fight against the craft tax – sales tax – I worked it out that you can handle a teapot* 52 times before you sell it, making the clay, putting it through the filter press, storing it so that it matures, kneading it, weighing it out, throwing one, two, three separate parts – the body, the spout, the lid - putting it away to dry for a time then turning the lid, attaching the spout, probably turning the rest of the body a little bit to get the shape that you finally want, putting it out to dry, putting it in a bisque kiln, bringing it out, waxing the bottom with a very fluid wax, and round the rim of the lid, and around the rim of the pot, glazing it, cleaning it – any surplus glaze that's in the pot itself that you don’t want in the pot [or] on the rims, firing it in the kilns, bringing it out, grinding the bottom, and if it needs a cane handle, making a cane handle and attaching it. You know it all adds up.

BR It sounds extraordinary. I can’t see how you make a living out of it at all. [Laughter].

PS You learn to be very fluent of course. It becomes a rhythm of activity. * "I like clay to look For instance, if I made casseroles, I wouldn’t make twenty at a time, I’d textured when it's fired …" make ten maybe, so that you never get bored with what you're doing. (PSP). You're working in a cycle. And if I made coffee mugs I would through a board full of mugs, which would be 14 mugs, and I’ve never really thrown more then 30 at a time, because you want to do other things. And then you’ve got to stack the kiln, of course, undo it, fire it, so it’s a labour of love, really.* What you get out of it is what you get.

BR And what you get out of it is…?

PS Satisfaction, and a sense of development, constantly refining your ideas * "I think it's very and looking for new ways.* When I first started out potting, I was so important that a potter makes pots to please inspired by Henry Moore, and another person I can’t think of at the himself …" (PSP). moment**, all I wanted to make, to be interested in, was just form. But then once you start to make big platters you think that’s a wonderful **Subsequently identified area to decorate, so I got into decoration, and thoroughly enjoyed that. as English sculptor Barbara And I used a lot of iron sand from the west coast – do you know about Hepworth (1903-1975); another source of that? inspiration being French- Romanian sculptor Constantin Brancusi (1876- 1957) (PS).

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BR Well I grew up in , so…

PS Oh, you do. I used to get it from Karekare – this sort of thing … that … and that … and that … [PS indicates glazes on various platters] It wasn’t a very black sand, it was the grey sand that was up the top of the sand hills […] a lovely mix of impure ingredients so that you get all these wonderful colours that sit on the glaze. With this iron sand you have to work very fast.

50 Most of the brownish glazes [PS indicates more pieces] are made from papa rock. You know papa rock? […] Siltstone? […] Half the North Island’s made of it. You go through [up] round Mt Messenger, for instance, and it’s falling down on the roads.

BR Grey, slippery…?

PS Grey, yes, it’s what they call volcanic tuft and [over] thousands of years it’s been deposited under the seas […] and it’s all been lifted up. I’ve made four different glazes out of this papa rock. That’s the brown [indicates pot] and this one, and the reddish [hue] of that. So you dip it in the first glaze, the brown glaze, which is called tenmoku; or a tessha, the red one, using the same material; then you pour the next glaze, having waxed the rim, you pour the next glaze in. And you work very fast because if it didn’t sink into the glaze it would fall off. So you have to put that in while it’s wet, and that’s good fun.

BR So presumably [inaudible] you’re experimenting.

PS I’ve used ironsand. And other potters used to mix it in with the clay to get a speckled effect, but I have used it in this fashion, and I – uh – it’s been a good thing.

BR Have there been periods in your work …?

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PS No.

BR … [or] has it all been evolutionary?

PS Been evolutionary. Influenced quite a bit by Nigerian bits and pieces, for instance, [PS picks up pot] it's called, in Hausa terms, this is called a guru, but it’s a belt they put around their pots. You can see it on this one here, or more particularly this one.

BR I should have brought a video camera!

PS You get these wonderful colours, look [inaudible] depending on the base glaze […] Very Nigerian …

BR They look Nigerian, I was going to say.

PS And I use a lot of wax resist patterns, for instance, this bowl – dip it in the glaze then wax this pattern on with this very fluid wax, and then brush the iron oxide over the top of it, and where the wax in it doesn’t take.

And in […] 2001, I was given an MNZM* for services to pottery, which * i.e. Member of the New was a bit of a laugh [laughter]. Go up and bow to the Governor General! Zealand Order of Merit for services to pottery, June 2002 (PS); 'Manukau People Gain Honours', Manukau Courier, 7/6/02, p. 5.

BR So have you had - do you think you’ve had - critical approval of your *Peter Stichbury, [teapot], work over the years? […] Recognition?* New Zealand Potter, 5:2, December 1962, [cover photograph]; 'Peter Stichbury' in New Zealand Potters: Their Work and Words, ed. Doreen Blumhardt, photographs Brian Brake, Wn., Reed, 1976, pp. 70-9; 'Guest Potter, Peter Stichbury' in Auckland Studio Potters 25th Annual Exhibition, Auckland War Memorial Museum, 14 Oct.-29 Oct., 1989 [catalogue], Auckland, 1989, p. 6.

PS Mm, pretty well – not that I looked for it, I wasn’t particularly interested *Besides the retrospective in fame, but it's been quite exciting to have this retrospective […] a 110- and other exhibitions noted above, Peter Stichbury has pots-spread around the gallery.* And for someone to ask for you to exhibited in the centenary have one is quite interesting. exhibition of the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts, Wellington, 1983, and 'Beeby the Enlightened Years', New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts, Wellington, 1992; also in a number of

19 overseas and travelling exhibitions:'Australian and New Zealand Pottery', National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 1962, [etc.]; a QEII Arts Council exhibition of pottery and prints, Canberra, 1969; Expo '70, Osaka, Japan, and Korea, 1973-4; 'New Zealand Pottery', Fremantle Arts Centre, Western Australia, 1979; etc. (PSS).

And we’ve had a very good curator friend of ours, Justine Olsen, who used to be the curator of fine arts at the museum, until she got married and had kids, and moved to Wellington. She’s been guest curator. We’ve had an interesting time sorting stuff out. And I’ve spent hours and hours going through hundreds of papers that I’ve collected over the years – just chucked them in a drawer, you know – she’s been very excited about the amount of material I had (photos and such). So it’s 100 been quite a task to sort all that out.

BR So it’s distilled your career?

PS It’s in a chronological sequence in the museum.

BR [I'd better] get up there this weekend, in that case.

PS And there’s a film [made by] Stan Jenkins in 19[78--1981]* who was an *Peter Stichbury, Potter. art specialist and an art lecturer in Palmerston North Teachers’ College, Dept. Education, 1981. Filmed by Stan Jenkins and a good mate of mine. In 1979-81 he made three 38mm films of 1978-81; words by Peter Mirek Smisek, Len Castle and myself, and that’s been shown at the Stichbury, spoken by museum, been put on a disc and just continually plays. So that’s Antony Groser, comment happening at the moment. It was [is] a very good film indeed. by Michael Haig.

BR To return to the work. You said you used iron sand glazes*. I was *"In and on glazes, mainly interested that you got the iron sand from Karekare rather than from [the on!" (PSE). west coast nearby].

PS Well, Karekare was the love of my life. We used to go out since I was a little boy, and Dad used to fish off the reef. Do you know it?

BR I don’t know it well […]

PS It’s a wonderful place – used to haunt the place…

BR I tend to go out on the Manukau Peninsula beaches […]

PS Yeah, of course.

BR Have, you - do you feel any of the forms and materials within South Auckland have influenced you, entered your work, living [as you do] in Manurewa?

20 PS Nothing here. No. I used to dig clay from a valley back of Ardmore for two years. It was just pure stoneware. I could dig it, chip it up, knead it and throw it. But that soon ran dry.

BR There was a pottery works in Drury from the 1860s through to the * 'Drury Pottery and 1930s, so there’s clay on the area that one can use.* Fireclay Works', Auckland- Waikato Historical Journal, 44, April 1984, p. 19.

PS Oh, there’s clay all over the place of course. It’s a matter of testing it. Actually we dug a few hundred tonnes of the stuff out of the farm next door – it was just [that] I knew the farmer - I tested it as well, but when I came to use it, it was a total disaster, so it’s sitting up there in a great heap at the moment. So all these things come into your life!

BR One or two potters I’ve talked to tell me it’s quite physically demanding too.

PS Yeah, it’s a physical thing. But, you know, I used to be able to pick up a hundred weight bag of feldspar, but now I can’t [laughter]. The trouble is that it was in paper and it used to bend. I had six tons of the stuff up in the shed once. We got it [through] Trevor Baylis [who] heard of an insurance lot that had unloaded this feldspar onto the wharf, and somebody had dropped a bag of lamp black on to it, so it was covered in this lampblack. It was totally unaffected, but I think we got it for about six dollars a bag, instead of whatever, so I bought sixty bags of it, and that lasted me, because I used to make the clay with it, the flux for the clay … So it was interesting.

But then another thing, as far as I was concerned, all my material * Hyde ball clay, marketed sources went dry. I used to buy the good strong clay from Crum Brick, as "Kaolin H", from Hyde, because they used to powder it for us and we could buy it in the powder Central Otago. form. And Huntly brick had a wonderful fire clay of 30% aluminium; it was just the right fireclay; and we uses to get a ball clay from - through agents here - from Hyde in Dunedin* – it was just the right thing. 150 But they’ve all disappeared. Crum Brick closed down because of the *Crum Brick Tile & pollution effect*; Huntly Brick sold out to an overseas company [who Pottery Co. Ltd was taken over by Ceramco Ltd in are] not producing it; and Hyde just disappeared too. But now you can 1975, and the works were buy clay made in Nelson, several different clays, which are good clays. closed down in 1978 (Dick They use it at the Studio Potters’ Centre. But mine was just right.** I Scott, Fire on the Clay, gave the recipe to lots of potters, and they used it. You get used to a Auckland, 1979, p. 139). particular clay and you know what you can do with it. It had a good **Stichbury Stoneware what we call a “tooth” – a good tough throwing quality, very little water Recipe: absorption once it was fired, that sort of thing. Huntly Fireclay AF30 – 80 Crum Brick Pipe Clay – 56 NZ Ball Clay - 40 Potash Feldspar – 22 (per 200lb [sic]) (PSS).

It’s quite an art. You have to do all the things you have to do. Cardew, *Helen Mason, 'Michael for instance, wasn’t interested in firing pots at all. He’d call himself a Cardew', New Zealand Potter, 9:1 (August 1966), mud-and-water man, you know, throwing, working on the wheel, that’s pp. 36-40; Katherine V. what his enjoyment was.* And when he developed this place fully… Goldsmith, 'Mud and

21 [PS indicates photo of Abuja] he hardly ever went near the kiln. All the Water Man', New Zealand boys use to fire it. But I love doing it.** Potter, 26:1 (1984), pp. 8- 10.

** Peter Stichbury, 'Kiln Efficency', New Zealand Potter, 2:1, August 1959), pp. 3-6; 'A Small Kiln', New Zealand Potter, 8:2, February, 1966, pp. 56-8.

BR That sounds – seems - the exciting part, doesn’t it?

PS Well, you’re charged with everything, making the clay, right through to finally putting the teapot handle on.

BR And then the glaze…

PS Yes, the glaze, lots of experiments with glaze. I’m not a technical man it that respect. It was more by guess or by God. But I did get some beautiful glazes…

BR Right […] You didn’t study the science behind it?

PS Tried to, but … Cardew and I tried to discern the atomic weights of different material and things to work out a glaze from that, but he was lost and I was lost. He knew what he was talking about, but I didn’t [laughter].

I don’t think he really used it! He was a brilliant man. He was a grad. [graduate] from Oxford, although he hated that. All he ever wanted to be was a potter… Self-taught geologist, because he had to find all the materials – found all the materials in Nigeria, straight out of the ground, you know. Went round with a little hammer. Sourced china clay up in the Jos Plateau, where they had a huge tin mine. Adjacent to that were these huge deposits of china clay, so that was good. Other miners that he’d got to know used to tell him where feldspar was and other materials.

BR Talking to you […] I’m conscious of how you’ve been such an independent potter. There’s not many New Zealand potters can have had experience in Nigeria […]

PS Luck of the draw!

BR Without knowing much about it I had thought that Japan was a significant influence.

PS No, not really, never has been …

BR I mean in New Zealand pottery.

PS Oh, there has been, sure […] the Martins for instance, down in *Bruce & Estelle Martin of Hastings.* She’s since passed on, but they were totally involved in the Kamaka Pottery in Japanese pots and a Japanese kiln called an anagama – big, whale- Hastings.

22 200 shaped [kiln] - that they fired for nine days at a time. Nine days and nights, and all the pots were just glazed by the ash […] wonderful pots.

BR Well, you’ve also lived in what is perhaps an atypical area for a potter […] in suburban Manurewa. It’s not Titirangi, even though there’s bush.

PS No, not Titirangi! When we were overseas we thought Titirangi would be quite a nice place to shift to, but this has done us very well […] we’re really in the country here – 'Great South Road country' [laughter].

BR […] It's a surprise! So the pots in the garden are your own too, are they?

PS Mmm, we could have brought the section next door, but we had three mortgages on the house anyway, so another whatever it was, was too much. And it was under separate title, so we would have had to pay rates on it.

BR How have the changes in the area affected you? The build up of the whole [urban] scene. Has it mattered to you? That a new city has grown up just a few miles up the road.

PS No! Well, it’s depressing in a way. We dodge them as far as we can.

BR I share the same feeling. We used to drive up from Waiuku and get on the motorway at , and it was just fields.

PS And Manurewa has just gone down the drain. I look at all those poor Indians who are sitting in their dairies with no one going in…

BR As a shopping centre, yes.

PS And another Chinese couple have just added a $2 shop there. There’s no-one in it. And all the shops in the centre itself – nothing left.

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BR Southmall used to be […]

PS Used to be the high …the centre, didn’t it? Very active. Oh well, take things as they come. I feel it a bit depressing, though. And who wants to live on the Great South Road?

BR Well, you’re back from it.

PS And we’ve got a huge temple down here. Have you seen it?

BR Yeah, I’ve seen it underway.

PS Sikh Temple.* And they’ve bought the home next door, three quarters *The local Nanaksar Thath of an acre, and they’re going to pull that down and put a car park there. Sikh community bought a nearby Great South Road property about 1990, and began the construction of a large temple there in 1999.

BR Just beside the shed [….]?

PS Just behind the workshop.

BR That’s a shame.

PS Oh no, it doesn’t worry us. They’re friendly. We hear them chanting every Saturday and Sunday, smell of curry.

BR Oh that’s a change, isn’t it? [Laughter.]

PS I think we should have a cup of tea!

BR Thank you very much.

PS We can go on again if you like…

BR Ok.

245 END OF FIRST INTERVIEW

MNP OH7: PETER STICHBURY

Supplementary interview with Peter Stichbury, potter, by Bruce Ringer, Manurewa, 25 June 2004 Ca 8 minutes

TAPE 2, SIDE A

BR Testing, testing. Supplementary Interview with Peter Stickbury, 25 June 2004.

24 Mr. Stichbury, when I went up to the retrospective exhibition one of the things which struck me was the very significant difference between your early work when you left for Nigeria and your work when you come back – well, in fact the work you’d done in Nigeria – particularly in the quality of the glazes.

PS Well, all the glazes of course in Nigeria were Cardew’s recipes, so I didn’t use any of my own particular recipes. They were established recipes and we just got in with the job; glazed the pots and fired them. So there was very little time …

We did experiment with some ash glazes which were reasonably successful, but that was about it. So these are Cardew's glazes, not mine … the Nigerian [glazes].

BR The ones in the Nigerian pots. But the quality – your own glazes – when you came back was brilliant, too.

PS Well, then there was a chance to really develop them, because other potters were gathering around and experimenting, and all my own experiments were by guess or by God rather then very scientific. But once you got to know materials and what they do in combination with others, then you’ve got a basis for experimenting, and you just make simple changes in row of glazes, and pick out the one that’s best.

So that was what was happening [….] Suppliers were coming forth with more materials and more materials, and establishing quite big firms as the years went on: people like C.C.G Ltd., and Talisman Potters on the North Shore, and now Western Potters, of course, in Avondale. As the tribes of potters grew, then so did the industry around them. Kilns were built; all that sort of thing - more chance to develop your own glaze recipes.

BR For instance, using ironsand?

PS Oh well, I did that right from the start.

BR And the way you did! I notice more color has entered your work in the decade or so, too.

PS Yes. You start to look for differences and build up news sorts of qualities in your work. And recipes, international publications of magazines contain recipes, [as do] many books. Cardew’s book was published, and other American potters, and English potters, and it become a whole scene – an amazing scene when you think about it. So we used other people’s glazes and modified them and they…

25

The statement was that, no matter who gave you your glaze, it wouldn’t come out the same as theirs [laughter] in the kiln, your kiln. And that was quite true because you had different clay and probably slightly different temperatures. That’s the fascinating part about it, I think.

BR You quite often – or recently – have used a quite brilliant but very subtle red.

PS Yes, that was not my recipe, actually. A friend gave me that one. But it’s a very hard glaze to fire. And the red of the quality in the exhibition is brilliant, but you could open a kiln - it would look like pig’s liver! It was terrible.

BR Well, yes there was a teapot and a vase and bowl, in *Peter Stichbury, Potter. Dept. that beautiful red. I felt covetous! [Laughter]. Which Education, 1981. Filmed by Stan Jenkins 1978-81; words by Peter brings me to the point: in the video that was made of Stichbury, spoken by Antony 50 your work – I’m quoting from that – you said, you Groser, comment by Michael talked about: "that special pot that has extra life". And Haig. also : "I think it’s very important that a potter made pots to please himself"*. What determined for you the pots that you kept rather than the pots that were too precious to you to sell?

PS Well, they had that special quality about them that appealed to me, and it’s a success story, in a sense, isn’t it? A really successful pot that you love and you don’t want to get rid of, it’s something ephemeral […] no it’s not ephemeral, it’s a long-lasting thing, and you have an idea of saving your best pots for your family for later on, to give them a sort of legacy.

BR So these are pieces that you haven’t been able to bring yourself to….

PS Oh absolutely. And there are pieces in there [the exhibition] that I wish I hadn’t sold, actually! [laughter].

BR Well many of the pots in the exhibition are still in your own collection […] or the family [...]

PS Oh, yes, a lot of them.

BR Are there any particular pots you’d nominate as your favorite pots of all, or pieces?

PS Um, I could show you photos of them! [Laughter] Yeah […] in the cabinet outside the exhibition, there’s a big green one with a textured pattern around it – that

26 one I love. Some of the platters. Quite a lot, actually. [Laughter.]

BR Indeed!

PS Well, that’s how they come to be in the show, you see, special ones. […] A lot of stuff I don’t want.

BR You said [incoherent] during the video, that perhaps one should be called an 'artist–craftsman'…

PS Well, what is art? You know, we had this stupid argument over years and years everywhere: Is pottery an art, or is it craft? You know, everything contains an element of art, doesn’t it?

BR Oh, does it matter?

PS Design, your suit [gesturing to interviewer's tweed jacket], it’s an art. Furniture's an art. You know, it’s not just somebody bashing away at a bit of wood or something […] It has to have a quality about it and inspiration about it. Art is inspiration, not just paint on a bit of canvas, to me.

I was really very excited about Danish furniture when that came out, and Swedish glass, and stainless steel cutlery, which we indulged in, after the background that we had as youngsters. You know: uncut moquette on the sofas, cut crystal, bone-handled knifes … It was just a [exclamation of disgust]!

BR Yes I remember those days. Of course, these things will have their day again.

PS Oh, yeah. Well it’s been a regressive step in the last [few years]. As the pottery scene’s died, they’ve brought in all this junk from overseas.

BR So, one is both an artist and a craftsman at the same 89 time. Yes, I think that's probably a good place to end.

END OF SUPPLEMENTARY INTERVIEW.

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