Gina Negroni

Ceramicist

©Isidora Gatica

Making every piece count

Gina works with high-temperature ceramics and porcelain
She opened her workshop in 2009
Glaze contrasts and fluid shapes characterise her work

Gina Negroni's relationship with clay dates back to her childhood when she watched her father, a ceramicist and sculptor, work at home. Growing up with a workshop in her home, she could experiment, learn techniques and develop her skills and talents. "I was able to observe and learn empirically," she says. "I participated in every work process, I even accompanied my father in selling at craft fairs. Later he dedicated himself to sculpture and I was his assistant in several works he did, where he worked on the human figure on a large scale." Gina works essentially with hand modelling, or from a base turned on a potter's wheel, which she transforms and models. "Hand modelling, or pinching, allows me to work from the beginning on the thinness and pressure of the container walls of utilitarian or artistic pieces," Gina explains. "Lathe modelling allows me to work faster, generating bases to then transform, refine, model, to achieve manual and unique pieces."

Interview

©Gina Negroni

©Gina Negroni

How do you relate to Temuco in Chile?: I relate to this country through the material. I am always looking to integrate local materials through experimentation and in my work. It is also in the forms that the landscape inspires me, the native flora and fauna. I take photographs, I look for books, I make sketches.
How does nature relate to your work?: It is my source of inspiration. Nature is the wisest feminine being, as a container of life, as a germ or seed, as a mother, as Earth, as a creator, transformer, strong and fragile at the same time. I am also inspired by the cultures that care for nature. In my close environment, it is the Mapuche culture.
Is there anything that particularly attracts you to your work?: The creative quests, the possibilities to experiment and keep on learning forever, to feel the plasticity of the material and to develop it into shapes, as well as the thousand working techniques. I like to connect with nature and its transformation into different states.
When you teach, what do you usually tell your students?: I instill in young people that their work should be done with dedication and respect for the resources used in ceramics. When a clay material becomes ceramic it is irreversible, it has already generated an imprint on the Earth and that is why it must be well made.

Gina Negroni is a master artisan: she began her career in 2009 and she started teaching in 2015