Slabhead Painting

Emmely Elgersma is a sculptor, painter and ceramist, currently living and working in London. Surrounded by buckets of PVA glue and stacks of newspapers, Emmely Elgersma uses her studio like a surreal kitchen, concocting wonky sculptures and wobbly objects that look good enough to eat (but probably don't taste very good). Creating clay from kitchen products and papier-mâché out of household chemicals, Elgersma's work is rooted in her formal training as a ceramicist, just with a couple of jokes thrown in. The result is an exploration of what vessels mean to us as human beings, like those old Roman pots they keep digging out of holes in Wiltshire but bright pink or baby blue, and full of the heady power of everyday emotions, like the memory of winning the World Cup in 1966 or drinking afternoon tea with your nan. She is absolutely serious and utterly unserious at the same time. Currently, she's waiting to see if she's made it into the Guinness World Record books for making the biggest ever papier-mâché sculpture back in February 2019. It was very, very big. Too big, if anything. She's recently completed her FA Level 1 coaching qualification so will happily tell you why 4-4-2 is more effective with a diamond and inverted wingers. The result is a joyous collision of colour, history, football and ceramics.