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He also self-defined as a working-class gay man, an activist and member of both the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) and later the Gay Left. Here, Suttie created his own version of a loving cup – a drinking container traditionally used in wedding ceremonies. Prior to coming to New York in 2016, he lived and worked in Minneapolis and Chicago. That act is not always entirely comfortable, ranging from empowering to eviscerating, tender to hurtful, blazing swords to wilted blossoms.

Through creating spaces, depicting our queer lives, building connections, and living out and proud lives, they show that even our softest work has a core of incredible strength” Dustin Yager

Guest Curator Dustin Yager has been working with clay for more than a dozen years, carefully developing expertise in working with porcelain on the pottery wheel.

i make pieces people can live with as both resistance and care, and am thrilled to donate everything i can to organizations serving and protecting LGBTQIA2S+ youth of faith

to date, i have been able to donate $2,354.06 to organizations supporting LGBTQIA2S+ youth of faith

tender / queer

tender / queer is an Online Invitational Exhibition celebrating Pride Month through ceramics.

For Suttie, these ceramics were more than a craft, but a way of life and perhaps an act of protest in itself.

“For Suttie, these ceramics were more than a craft, but a way of life and perhaps an act of protest in itself”

The exhibition catalogue that accompanied his 2018 retrospective at the Ruthin Craft Centre records: ‘My work is saying, I don’t believe in what is happening.

Suttie's 'Budgie Teapot' is part of the Crafts Council exhibitionGreat and Small: Crafted Creatures, now at the Dick Institute in East Ayrshire until 20 August

Heath Widdiss: Continuing the Widdiss Family Legacy

Gay Head Pottery artisan Heath ‘Strong Fox’ Widdiss is the proud grandson of the late Gladys ‘Wild Cranberry’ Widdiss, a well-known Aquinnah Wampanoag Tribal potter, historian, and leader.

Although he had a short career of little more than a decade, his ceramics remain an important record of his activism: a quieter form of protest away from the pickets and parades. Most of Suttie’s pieces from the early 1980s are marked by an explosion of colour, as seen in Doodle Plate (1982), which is decorated with a rainbow of various glazes, lustres and enamels.

gay pottery

The creases in the modelled clay, like folds of skin, are made more visible by its partially glazed state. Suttie’s playful and sometimes subversive versions of functional pottery forms show us that queer joy is an act of resistance.

Suttie passed away from an HIV-related illness in 1993, aged just 46.

As the ceramic artist’s work goes on show in the Crafts Council Gallery’s study, queer craft expert Daniel Fountain considers his life and work

Angus Suttie was a leading figure of the New Ceramics movement – a group whose surrealist designs challenged traditional notions of functional pottery through the 1970s and beyond.

The article, titled ‘From Latent To Blatant’, outlines Suttie’s tense relationship with his mother, father, two brothers and two sisters, who often expressed distaste for his love of dressing up. The artists in this exhibition not only display an emotional range in their ceramic works, but also have deep engagements with their communities. They have an undeniable sense of vibrancy, energy and pride.

Other works such as Loving Cup (1985), made a year after his lover died of HIV/AIDS, are much more sombre in tone.

Reflecting his love of drama, these rings are gawdy, theatrical and incredibly awkward to wear, playing on the expectations that jewellery should be compact and expensive status symbols. Here he became immersed in the gay subculture of the city, often cruising for sex in public toilets and movie theatres.

After two years of living in London, he became involved with the Gay Liberation Front (GLF): a group which fought for the rights of LGBTQ+ people, urging them to question oppressive structures and to be ‘loud and proud’ with their identities.

He is originally from Wyoming and now lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.

full stop. Participating artists include: Shea Burke, Aaron Caldwell, Heather Mae Erickson, phi le, Anika Major, and Maya Vivas.

“As LGBTQ artists, we open up the stories of our lives through our work, and how we talk about it—in person, online, and in writing. ‘I started by wanting to make pots which were a reaction against the white, factory-produced earthenware available in every high street… I discovered vessels that were alive, appealing, moving, imaginative, witty, revealing pleasure in the making’, an article by Christopher Andreae records him saying.

Rejecting mass-produced forms, Suttie’s ceramics were largely hand built, giving them their signature raw, organic quality.

Indents of nimble fingers and thumbs also remain in its surface. Yet, the then-prime minister Margaret Thatcher refuted the legitimacy of homosexual relationships, calling them ‘a pretend family relationship’, and opposed the idea of HIV/AIDS awareness.