About Annie Cap

I have an insane love for rocks, especially shiny obsidian and sparkling crystals. I even collect common British flint stones off the beach in Hythe, where I swim year-round in the English Channel.

With a Fine Arts degree and a major in International Business, my telecommunications career brought me to London almost 30 years ago. I live in the rural Southeast, in the Garden of England, just outside Canterbury with my English husband. But I grew up in the USA, in the gorgeous Pacific Northwest, in Seattle, Washington and Portland and Corvallis, Oregon.

It was here where my parents passed on their passion for water, going out on the Puget Sound or the Pacific Ocean most weekends—even though mum couldn’t swim. This is also where I would scour the windswept beaches, rain or shine with my mum, heads down looking for agates.

Both of my creative parents loved everything about nature, but it was my dad who taught me, ‘anything is possible if you put your mind to it’.

Along with the dramatic physical beauty of the Pacific Northwest (where I lived until I was 37), the indigenous Northwest Coast Peoples’ art and their understanding that everything is one imprinted on me. The patterns they create, and the patterns found in nature, either strong and bold, or subtle and pastel, preoccupy me to this day.

Although I’m attracted most to dramatic contrasts of line and colour, I’m also like many artists I am fascinated with shimmering reflections on water and the crazy metallic colours of a beetles’ body, bird features and butterfly wings.

My artistic goal has always been to mimic these natural patterns, like what I collected on Oregon’s beaches and knee-deep in Willamette Valley mud. I first accomplished this through my paintings, and now I grow my own crystals (pinch me), manipulating the kiln’s temperatures to create contrasting halos—just like a banded agate. My ceramics are meant to look organic, like something one might dig up or find on a beach.

I take a lot time and care too in my making, as well as in my glaze creations. I’m definitely not a production potter. I’m slow on purpose, often keeping pieces for years until I’ve created both a glaze and firing strategy worthy of them. Everything I do is done thoughtfully and in appreciation of the materials and of the simple, joyful act of creating.

Welcome to my world, and thank you. —Annie