Studio Visits: Rana Begum RA, Alison Rees and Conrad Shawcross RA
Wednesday 6 November, 8am-7.15pm (including coach from Cambridge) or 10.30am-5pm (studio visits and transport within London only)
Join the Friends of Kettle’s Yard on a day in London dedicated to ceramics and sculpture.
This visit is now sold out. Please email friends@kettlesyard.cam.ac.uk to join the waiting list.
About Conrad Shawcross RA
The ballet aficionados amongst you may have seen Conrad’s moving robot, Diana, as part of the set of Wayne McGregor’s Machina, one of the works in the Royal Ballet’s mixed programme Metamorphosis: Titian 2012. Conrad’s sculptures have strong geometric and mathematical themes that you can experience vividly in his Cascading Principles exhibition until June 2025 in the wonderful setting of the Oxford Mathematical Institute. We will have the pleasure of visiting his Hackney studio where he will tell us more about how philosophical and scientific ideas inform his art.
About Alison Rees
Alison completed her PhD at the Royal College of Art last year. Her porcelain pages combine the materiality of clay with the language of the paper page to tell an abstract story of self and place. These wall-mounted pages can be combined and rearranged in new and surprising permutations. In 2024, she was selected by the Crafts Council to create two installations for Collect Art Fair at Somerset House, where she was chosen by World of Interiors as an artist to celebrate twenty years of Collect. Alison’s work will complement Rana Begum’s home-studio, the last stop of our trip, beautifully.
About Rana Begum RA
Some of you may remember Rana’s immersive intervention of baskets in St Peter’s Church during the Actions exhibition, following the re-opening of Kettle’s Yard. More recently, Rana has been supporting Kettle’s Yard by designing a set of limited-edition buttons. We will visit her award-winning home-studio overlooking Stoke Newington’s Abney Park cemetery, where we will learn more about her practice that is concerned with form and light in flux. Together with Peter Culley, her architect from Spatial Affairs Bureau, she will also explain how these interests have informed the design of her home that combines spaces for her family, studio, and an artist from her residency programme. One of Rana’s installations (included in the gallery below) is on display at Pallant House Gallery until July 2026, where you can also savour The Shape of Things: Still Life in Britain until October 2024.
Important Information
A very limited number of discounted tickets without transport from Cambridge are available (i.e. you can join the group at 10.30am at Conrad’s studio in Hackney – we will share the precise address in November). Once the London-only tickets are sold out, but you would still like to attend, please buy a ticket with transport from Cambridge and simply join us in London.
Lunch is not included in the fee for the trip. Also, please note that we will walk for about 15 minutes from Pizza Pappagone to Alison’s studio. The studios have stairs and are not wheelchair-accessible.
All proceeds support Kettle’s Yard. Refunds are not possible, unless the visit is cancelled by Kettle’s Yard.
Itinerary
For those travelling from Cambridge by coach, the schedule will be:
8am Departure from Trumpington Road (Botanic Garden)
8.30am Departure from second pick-up point at Madingley Road Park & Ride
10.30am Shawcross studio visit
12pm Bus transfer to Pizza Pappagone
12.30pm Lunch at Pizza Pappagone
1.45pm Walk to Rees studio
2pm Rees studio visit
2.45pm Bus transfer to Begum studio
3pm Begum studio visit
5pm Departure from Begum studio
7pm Arrival at Madingley Road Park & Ride
7.15pm Arrival at Trumpington Road (Botanic Garden)
Gallery
