180 The Strand
Surrounded by buckets of PVA glue and stacks of newspapers, Emmely Elgersma uses her studio like a surreal kitchen, concocting wonky sculptures and wobbly objects that look good enough to eat (but probably don’t taste very good). Creating clay from kitchen products and papier-mâché out of household chemicals, Elgersma’s work is rooted in her formal training as a ceramicist, just with a couple of jokes thrown in. The result is an exploration of what vessels mean to us as human beings, like those old Roman pots they keep digging out of holes in Wiltshire but bright pink or baby blue, and full of the heady power of everyday emotions, like the memory of winning the World Cup in 1966 or drinking afternoon tea with your nan. You can read more about Emmely and shop her collection below.
I categorise myself as a sculptor, ceramist and football coach which I think covers all my creative interests. I became a ceramist back in 2012 totally by accident and then this evolved into large scale sculpting with paper mache during my MAFA at Chelsea College of Arts. On the side of all this I wanted to learn a new skill and take myself out of my comfort zone and that is how I got into football coaching.
My studio is in East London, Stoke Newington and in an old zip factory. I share it with my friend Jo Kitchen, a painter. It is very cold in the winter and extremely warm in the summer but I have loved the past year I have spent working there.
I would make Ottolenghi’s celeriac steaks with Café de Paris sauce and on the guest list we would have, Franz West, Son Heung-min, David Hockney and Maxine Peake.
I was really late to the game and just watched the 1992 Candyman which I think is beautiful regardless of it being absolutely terrifying! I love Philip Glass and he does the soundtrack for the film which he did for one of my favourite films Koyaanisqatsi. Book-wise I recently read Klara and the Sun by Kazoo Ishiguro and that made me feel really weird and sad.
Football Manager!
Virgo. I only ever really look at my horoscope when I am sad, but I guess the time of year you are born does have an impact on your personality. I was born the end of August so only made it into my school year by three days which always meant I had to work a lot harder to keep up with the older kids in the same year, but Virgo spans over August and September so my theory doesn’t really support the question BUT I will never date a Scorpio.
