Zoë Pinnell is a ceramicist working out of her communal studio, Hamilton Craft Studios, in Hamilton, Ontario. She is a recent a graduate of Sheridan College where she received a Bachelors of Craft and Design. She has received many awards including; Best in Show (Gardiner Museum, 2017), Pottery Supply House Award (2017), Medalta Residency Award (2018), Joan Bennett Award (2020), Best of Functional (Fusion Clay & Glass, 2022). Zoë has also attended residencies across Canada, both Harbourfront Centre and Medalta. She has participated in many in person and online shows including; Made in Canada (Gardiner Musem, 2017), Mud Ties Minneapolis (Minneapolis, 2019), Lucid (Gardiner Museum, 2020), Spark Reflector (SAMARA Contemporary, 2020), The Ceramics Congress (Online, 2021), Clay to Table (Online, 2021), Clay Gardens (Harbourfront Centre, 2021), Plant Pots (Charlie Cummings Gallery, Online, 2021), Fusion Clay & Glass Show (Wychwood Barns, 2022), and Ash & Barrel Invitational (Fairweather Brewery, 2022). In February 2020, Zoës research on soda firing earthenware was published in Justin Rothshanks ‘Low Fire Soda’.
Zoë has a deep passion for education in ceramics which has led her to teaching classes, leading panels, and workshops across the GTA and online. She also works closely with her North American based collective pop-up, Mud Ties, bringing yearly exhibition, sale, and community opportunities to emerging ceramic artists in Canada and the USA. Mud Ties has now grown a following large enough to continue communal support within ceramics year-round.
Zoës work consists of illustrated sculptural and functional handbuilt objects that are decorated with colourful glazes, underglaze, and terra sigillata. Her work is handbuilt by pinching, coiling, and slab building using earthenware. She fires her work in an electric kiln to a hot Cone 03, creating more of a toastiness in the red clay. Earthenware is an honour to the earth that we walk on and grow our gardens with, using the deep terracotta to create warmth and depth in her surfaces, luring you into her narratives. Zoë is heavily influenced by historical patterns, tchotchke objects, and floral motifs, creating her patterns and illustrations from memories of what something may look like, but not entirely be. Her highly decorative work will bring you on a journey through the growth and interaction of gardens we grow while meeting the creatures, from bugs to beasts, that reside in them.