‘Brown Cow’

“My fascination for anatomy goes as far back as I can remember. My aim is to capture the piece from inside to out from stretching slabs of clay to form a rib cage, rump, neck etc, right down to the feet. The challenge is combining an anatomical approach with capturing the essence of the creature,” Elaine Peto

Elaine is an artist and sculptor based in Hampshire, renowned for her animal ceramic sculptures. Upon graduation from Exeter College of Art and Design, Peto set up her studio in Hampshire in 1987. Her career has soared since then and she has carried out extensive work for television, for example, providing drawings and sculptures for props for ‘Midsummer Murders’, appearing on ‘Collectors’ Lot’ and ‘Countryways’. This highly-desirable artist has been featured in many magazines, including ‘The Craftsman’; ‘Inspirations’; ‘Country Living’; ‘Garden Inspirations’; ‘World of Interiors’; ‘Homes And Antiques’ and ‘Ceramic Review’, as well as the ‘Observer’ and ‘Guardian’ newspapers.

Texture plays a large part in most of Elaine Peto’s pieces. As she says: ‘I love to work with different pieces of fabric, shells, netting and brushes, which are impressed into the clay, forming a reference to animal hide and brand marks, or sometimes just pure indulgence’.

Most pieces are made from stoneware clay and decorated with slips, stains and glazes. These powerful pieces realistically recreate the muscularity, movement and bones of the animals whilst revelling in the glorious textures and creative possibilities of the clay and slip. Subjects range from farm animals to exotic wild animals, stags, dogs and horses, hares and more recently mythological pieces. In 2005, she went to South Africa and Botswana for three months, to study the anatomy of wild animals at close hand.