Identify studio pottery inscribed W mark - Alan Wallwork?

Hi
I was wondering if anybody has any ideas on this mark. Many thanks x
Ness

Interesting piece. I've never seen a bowl by Alan Wallwork - I think he was just a handbuilder - but the clay and glaze are similar to his work, but could just as easily be a student piece. I don't think we'll ever know.

The W mark alone was used in Alan Wallwork's production pottery. Which produced repetition pieces. Which ran in some form or another for over 30 years. So it quite conceivably could have been a trial piece or a low production piece. The W was often freehand, so often comes in different shapes. So it might well be by Alan Wallwork.

There was some discussion about the W; saying that Wallwork used it himself too

No doubt he did. But on the other hand the market does not recognise that. As items with the plain W on generally sell for less than the AW marked ones.

NaomiM wrote:Interesting piece. I've never seen a bowl by Alan Wallwork - I think he was just a handbuilder - but the clay and glaze are similar to his work, but could just as easily be a student piece. I don't think we'll ever know.

If Alan had heard you say that I would have loved to have counted how many expletives he would have used in his reply. All in the nicest possible way and not meant to offend.

Virtually all of the work marked AW was initially thrown or partly thrown. Then it was often cut and reassembled.

The cylinders usually marked with a W were much easier for assistants to make quickly rather teaching people to throw. However, like Shoji Hamada's vases that Hamada never threw, Alan generally did the decoration on the final pieces (unless he had a big order that needed to go out and then it was "all hands of decks").

NaomiM wrote:There was some discussion about the W; saying that Wallwork used it himself too

As Alan did the decoration on the vast majority of cylinders he would have also added the W

philpot wrote:No doubt he did. But on the other hand the market does not recognise that. As items with the plain W on generally sell for less than the AW marked ones.

You are quite correct philpot but it is interesting that a vase that has only been decorated by Shoji Hamada is regards as his. My view is that Bernard Leach and his book are to blame for making the British believe that the artist potter worked alone and did everything himself.

Regarding the bowl that started this thread - my view is that it could have been made by Alan Wallwork but it would be very difficult to prove. Also even if you could I don't think that it would alter its value significantly.

Many years ago Alan gave me a couple of fairly tall tenmoku glazed vases to sell on his behalf, which I did but for very little money. They had been made when he began potting in Forest Hill (South London) but they came out of a shed at his pottery in Lyme Regis in Dorset, so they had travelled. They were in a standard glaze used by potters working in the Anglo-Oriental tradition as it was known, something that could be said about this bowl.

Hi Ness,
Theres a mug or jug in the second photo with a similar glaze to your w-mark bowl. Is it connected to the bowl or from somewhere else entirely?