Artist Database

Barbara Jackson’s pots, inspired by nature and feminism, are presented in calabash forms. They reflect the diversity of South African culture and can be recognised worldwide for their distinctive vibrancy, passionate shapes and dynamic use of colour. Jackson aimed to promote the visual arts and elevate the status of ceramics in South Africa by means of education, documentation and the motivation and promotion of new artists whose work reflects a contemporary South Africa. Born in Cape town, this self-trained ceramist founded the Barbara Jackson School of Ceramics in l976. Committed to art education and community work, she published two instructional books (Tafelberg Press), taught at the Community Arts Project in Cape Town and held workshops for homeless children.

Jackson’s work has been exhibited widely in South Africa, the USA, Europe and the Far East, and is in the collections of the Johannesburg Art Gallery, SA Cultural History Museum, Tatham Art Gallery, and Sasol in South Africa, as well as in the Museum of Decorative Art, Montreal, Canada, the Natural History Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, and the Liepzig University Collection, Germany.