2006 Alberta Craft
Council
Linda Stanier and Family Memorial Award Recipient
Alberta Centennial Medal for the Arts Recipient
In 2002 John became a member of the
Royal Canadian Academy of Art (RCA).
In
March 2000, after over 30 years in the forefront of Canadian ceramics,
John Chalke received the first ever Governor General's Award in Visual
and Media Arts for Fine Craft.
John Chalke's work is
both thrown and hand built. The clay body used is made at home from
native Saskatchewan clays. Different kilns are used for specific
temperatures, including a three-chamber wood-fired kiln in the southwest
Alberta foothills.
"It's
still hard to know how my pre-making mind operates. I know it
sometimes calls upon quarries of ideas, which are based on known
previous historical and cultural contacts ... early American and
English slipware, French wood-fired country pots, Japanese Oribe
designs, woodcuts from early children's books. But then there is
another pulse which sporadically appears above the thought horizon,
like northern lights. It might be the peeling red and blue paint on a
barn door ... or a folk art weathervane ... perhaps the word "Clinchfield"
on a boxcar across the tracks…. What the objects I make must have to
operate successfully is a comfortable relationship with the human
scale: for example, an engaging encounter with both hands. But they
should maintain a querulous position also, like dug up jewelry or a
table top in the rain."
John Chalke has
been working with clay for over 40 years. Born in the United Kingdom in 1940,
he received an Art Teacher's Certificate in education from the Bath
Academy of Art in 1962. Soon after setting up a studio in London, his
work was being exhibited at the city's Design Centre. He taught at the
Farnham and Harrow schools of art before emigrating to Canada in 1968.
While he has
taught throughout his career—at the University of Alberta, the
University of Calgary and the Alberta College of Art and Design—the
main focus of his energy has been in the studio. John fired his first
wood kiln in 1962 and has been building and firing them ever since - in
England, Japan, the United States, and Canada. Over his career he has
participated in over 240 national and international exhibitions. These
include exhibitions and competitions in New York, San Angelo (Texas),
Chicago, Lausanne, Tokyo, London, Koblenz, Sydney, Montreal, Toronto,
Edmonton and Calgary
Chalke's
contribution to his craft, including ground-breaking research, has been
recognized in some 25 books on ceramic art and in numerous magazine and
journal articles. His jury duty has been extensive: he was the sole
judge for the prestigious Fletcher Challenge Ceramics Award in Auckland
(1996) and was the sole judge for the 2000 Sydney Myer International
Ceramics Award in Australia.
In 2000 John was the first recipient of the prestigious Governor
General's Award for Fine Craft.
Chalke is one
of four Canadian ceramists to have had work purchased by the Victoria
and Albert Museum. His work is also found in private and public
collections throughout North America, in the U.K., Italy, Japan, France
and Australia. In Canada, these include the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the
Canadian Clay and Glass Gallery, the Canada Council Art Bank and the
Bronfman Corporate Collection. John is the recipient of the first
Governor Generals' Award in Media and Visual Arts for Fine Craft (2000). He lives in
Calgary with his wife and fellow ceramic artist Barbara Tipton.
