Nineteen Years On, a Brisbane Potter Is Still in Conversation With Her Mother

Nineteen years after losing her mother — herself a gifted potter — Brisbane ceramicist Jenna Catchpole channels that loss through her craft. "I'm continuing a conversation with her through clay," Catchpole says. That conversation returns to West End's Vacant Assembly this September with Her Flame, My Hands, now in its second year.

What began in 2025 as Catchpole's first solo exhibition has become an annual fixture, built around memory, inheritance, grief and the enduring relationship between mother and daughter. The show's title captures the throughline directly — a mother's flame, now in her daughter's hands.

The technique itself is as unforgiving as it is deliberate. "My practice centres on atmospheric woodfiring. Each work spends several days inside an Anagama kiln, where flame, ash and heat become collaborators," she says. The results are unrepeatable by nature — each surface a record of exactly how it moved through fire, shaped as much by the kiln as by the hands that built it.

The exhibition arrives on the back of real momentum for Catchpole this year. Two of her works were selected as finalists in the Biennial North Queensland Ceramic Awards, chosen from just 78 works nationally, alongside a finalist placing in the Infuse Art Prize and a recent showing of Forged in Fire at Jan Manton Gallery.

Her Flame, My Hands 2026 runs 1–13 September at Vacant Assembly, West End, with an opening event on Saturday 5 September from 2–5pm and speeches at 3pm. The gallery is open Thursday 10am–4pm, Friday 1–4pm, and Saturday–Sunday 10am–4pm, or by private appointment.