Richard Batterham

Richard Batterham did not do a great deal of salt glaze. So there is your first problem. He rarely put numbers like that on his pots. Not to say never, but it would be unusual. He has been imitated a great deal, as his work is as near perfection as you can get in a specific branch of studio pottery. Because it is not marked a lot of Ebay sellers market pots that vaguely look like Batterham, as his. It is your normal Ebay minefield. Not to say anything about Oxford Ceramics of course, they are one of the top dealers in the field and no doubt their Batterham is entirely kosher.

A Batterham pot often just sings. It has a stylistic perfection of 60 odd years of potting. It has a look, a beauty that is just umistakeable. At this precise moment I am looking at one of his teapots. You cannot mistake it for anyone else!

So as to this one. Where did you get it? Provenance is important. Batterham rarely comes up at Boot Sales. Those three firing spots on the bottom do not look like a Batterham technique. The cut sided is perhaps just not quite elegant enough. If if was on Ebay as a Batterham I personally would not buy it!

The sloping cuts are typical of Batterham but I agree with Philpot that the rest doesn’t look right. There are a number of other studio potters who make cut sided pots but without a mark it’ll take a little longer to remember who they are

Checking it with a number of Batterham’s pieces I agree it’s his. I don’t know what the number represents; Maybe a test piece

Very interesting. You do learn a lot on here!

,


Cut sided 10 inch vase.

I think that collecting Richard Batterham is a very good place to start. His smaller work is fairly cheap for the exceptional quality that he produces. Moreover even the very large pieces are fetching nothing like the stratospheric prices that others are now getting. Equally, I think their attraction will last a lot longer than some other of the later Leach style potters. They are so quintessentially beautiful. Just stripped back to the very core that makes superb study pottery.

How tall is it?

Probably the best video on Richard Batterham. Produced by Gallery owner Joanna Bird.

Unpacking Richard Batterham. Literally that, an 11 minute video of an American lady unpacking a large box full of Richard Batterham pottery which had taken a long time to get to here. Its weirdly fascinating to see it all emerging.  
           Reminds me of the time when I was in Primavera in Cambridge, and they had a large box of Richard Batterham wares on the floor being unpacked. Same thing with lots and lots of straw.