New exhibition showcases the ‘quiet menace’ and brilliance of Laura Ford

Stephen Price

An exhibition of ceramic sculptures by acclaimed Cardiff-born artist, Laura Ford has launched in Cardiff, showcasing new ‘menacing’ works inspired by her enchanting childhood travelling with fairground owners.

Ford is renowned for her fantastical, anthropomorphic creatures – comical and playful, often with a sinister edge. Her figures are pointedly and recognisably human but masked by costumes and animal characters, simultaneously cute and weird, comforting and terrifying. The figures tend to be captured in the throws of high emotion – with faces covered, forcing the audience to respond instinctively, taking cues from postures and body language.

‘Hot then Cold and In Between’ showcases the results of a flurry of activity in the medium of ceramics. Although evident throughout Ford’s career – some artworks on show date from 1998 – the surge in use of clay and glazes has been another fruitful result of the move from central London to the Matt Black Barn, a custom-built studio and home on the outskirts of Chichester.

Multiple studio spaces enable the separation of ceramics – with its dusty, wet conditions – from the clean, dry environment required for working with fabric, the medium Ford typically employs to costume her jesmonite and steel figures.

Worldwide acclaim

Laura Ford studied at Bath Academy of Art from 1978-82 and at Chelsea School of Art from 1982-83. Ford is unique in having become identified with the New British Sculpture movement from her participation in the 1983 survey exhibition The Sculpture Show at Serpentine Gallery and the Hayward, as well as participating in British Art Show 5 in 2000 and representing Wales in the 51st Venice Biennale in 2005.

Her fantastical, witty and often menacing work is held in many public collections including the British Government art collection, National Museum of Wales, The Victoria and Albert Museum, Tate Gallery, London Museum of Modern Art, University of Iowa; Arts Council of Great Britain; Contemporary Art Society; Unilever plc; Penguin Books; Oldham Art Gallery, The New Art Gallery Walsall, The Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, The Meijier Gardens, Grand Rapids USA and The Gateway Foundation, St. Louis, as well as numerous private collections.

While the space has allowed for increased concentration on clay, the development of her ceramics practice also reflects a deeper creative need: clay allows a way of making quickly, providing an immediate visualisation of an idea.

Through the processes of hand-building, joining slabs and quick casts, forms are sculpted and moulded, and narratives emerge.

Anthropomorphism

Here we see animals doing human things – a skiing cat, hungover birds, crawling bunny/dog hybrids – stills of an ongoing tale. The large ceramic sculpture, ‘The Snorkeler and the Seal’, places the visual emphasis on the sea creature, who, in a curious role reversal, hugs the human like a pet, as if posing to capture the meeting. The Stump series, with editions spanning from 1998 to 2025, depict tree trunks with little girl legs in red Mary Janes: two elements melded together with no discernible end of one/beginning of the other – nature quite literally consuming the body – a dressing-up session of unbridled, naive fun. The theatre of it all!

It’s this perceived naivety, inherent in children and animals, which masterfully belies the impact of Ford’s work – these illustrations of human behaviour, imagined and embodied in something not wholly human, allow us to get close, to see parts of ourselves reflected in the physical stances of emotions, and to consider our response.

This exhibition is further testament to Ford’s accomplishments as both a sculptor and storyteller – whatever her medium.

Ford shared: “I spent my childhood in the intense, hermetic world of the travelling showman community. My family had a fixation with collectable ceramic ornaments, filling their homes and caravans with figurines – romantic, pastoral scenes, so different from our chaotic lives.

“On the shooters and booths too, the prizes were little plaster ornaments: boys, girls, animals, frozen in time. While my family worked the amusement arcade and bingo, I found escape in these objects, taking them down, arranging them, watching relationships emerge between them, inventing the sometimes sinister, sometimes funny stories that connected them. It’s that same sense of eerie serendipity and quiet menace that I’ve drawn on in this new body of ceramic sculptures’ – Laura Ford

Laura Ford, Hot then Cold and In Between runs at Ten Gallery, 143 Donald Street, Roath, Cardiff until 25 October 2025. All works can be viewed and purchased in person or online.