PRIVATE ART/POTTERY COLLECTION + ESTATE AUCTION
Thursday, 3 - Monday, 7 September 2026

Briar Gardner (1879–1968) - Bowl with koru decoration

Lot Details

incised koru decoration to rim, pale mauve exterior with maroon highlighted interior glazed ceramic, full signature incised to base, 45 x 100 x 100mm Briar Gardner’s (1879–1968) family had generational roots in the brick and pipe industry, though she was in her mid 50’s before she discovered studio pottery, and “taught herself pottery by trial and error”. Descriptions of Briar Gardner’s output levied against those of her historical stature and influence seem antithetical. Perhaps this is because her ceramics beg not to be reduced to simple pots — but seen as enthusiastic exercises in discovery — art through experimentation. Accounts of Briar Gardner paint her as endlessly curious, joyously contrarian, unconventional and unabashed — a personality which is intrinsic through her work — “her hands were never idle and whatever she touched reflected something of her original nature”. Of a 1930’s educational film featuring Briar Gardner, John Parker notes, “the sheer exuberance with which she attacks the bisqueware with the glazes is infectious.” Briar Gardner produced enduring and exceptional pots, arguably becoming New Zealand’s first studio potter simply by “following her own inspiration”. Though ‘Anglo-Oriental influences [would become] dominant in studio ceramics it is undeniable that ceramic history in Aotearoa followed Gardner’s inspiration, too. Almost a century ago, on first discovering a catalogue of glazes, Gardner enthused over “every colour and many shades and tints of each to make any lover of colour aflame with desire to use them all”. Gardner’s resulting pots have much the same effect — to make any lover of colour aflame with desire. Confronted by her family over her “inability to grasp the economic significance of the ‘reproducible experiment’ … her answer was always the same… ‘That would not be art’”.