Emilie Taylor

b.1980, Sheffield, UK

Emilie Taylor uses heritage crafts, particularly traditional slipware, to interpret and represent post-industrial landscapes. Emilie is interested in the vessel or container as a metaphor for how we seek to contain communities, and community rituals, within British society, and has an ongoing interest in the firing process as alchemically potent and symbolic of change. 

'I handbuild my work using coils or slabs, and decorate using slip, sgraffito and handmade stencils. Once a piece is built in clay I layer the decoration with different thicknesses of slip and a combination of tight formal pattern and looser hand drawn and printed slip designs.

I then draw landscapes and narratives onto the decorated surface, figures and buildings I will have photographed and drawn when researching the themes for the work. I sometimes need to build up three to four layers of slip before using a sgraffito tool to add lines and movement drawing in the detail. After a bisque fire the pieces are glazed and fired again to stoneware temperature. I then add 18ct gold lustre or handprinted gold transfers and fire the work a third and final time to bond the gold with the glaze.' 

Her work offers new interpretation to the contemporary urban context and its severance with ties to past community rituals. Large pieces and installations blur the boundaries between Gallery and Museum, Fine Art and the anthropological elements of Craft.

Emilie draws inspiration from folklore, feminism, and community dynamics, often referencing ancient stories and local histories in her creations. Her work, deeply rooted in slipware traditions, tells personal and political stories, challenging contemporary narratives. Emilie's pieces are exhibited globally, including at 'Lives Less Ordinary' at Two Temple Place, and are held in prestigious public collections such as the V&A and Gallery Oldham. She received the Cynthia Corbett Gallery & Young Masters ‘Focus on the Female’ Award in 2022, affirming her impact on the art world.

Emilie Trained in Fine Art (BA hons First Class) at Liverpool John Moores, graduating 2001 and has a Masters in Art Psychotherapy that informs her ideas about the anthropological significance of making in communities and community ritual. She has lectured about her practice at the Royal College, Cheltenham Literature Festival, on behalf of Arts Council England and the Crafts Council. As well as at many universities and art institutions. Emilie has completed residencies in the UK and abroad, and has exhibited at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Ruthin Craft Centre, Gallery Oldham, and the Arts & Crafts House Blackwell. She had a solo exhibition (Tubthumping) which opened on March 8th 2023 at the National Civil War Centre. The body of work included in the show took as a subject the experiences of women in the early modern period and explored the similarities linking them and the experiences of women today. Her work forms part of public and private collections. In addition, Cynthia Corbett Gallery & its not-for-profit art initiative Young Masters Art Prize were invited by the Michelangelo Foundation to feature Emilie Taylor's artwork in their inaugural Homo Faber exhibition in Venice during the Biennale d'Arte in April 2022.

In 2024 Emilie will be working with Bradford Museums to create new pieces for their collection and will also be working with the Stradling collection in Bristol to respond to the slipware ceramics of Sam Haile held in their collection. Both projects will culminate in exhibitions later in the year.

She will also lead an ongoing project with women exiting the criminal justice system who will be creating ceramic work for exhibition in 2025.

Emilie Taylor is represented internationally by Cynthia Corbett Gallery and was the winner of the Focus On The Female Young Masters Art Award 2021.