about gailan

Gailan Ngan is a Vancouver-based ceramist and visual artist who has been presenting her work professionally for over ten years. Originally from Hornby Island, British Columbia, Gailan began her ongoing fascination with the possibilities of ceramics at an early age, first as a studio assistant - and eventual apprentice - to her father, Wayne Ngan. She founded her own studio, Cornershop, in the Strathcona neighbourhood of Vancouver in 1997, and graduated from the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in 2002.

Ngan's ceramics have been exhibited extensively throughout British Columbia at venues such as Small Medium Large, the Vancouver International Airport, the Canadian Craft Museum, and the Museum of Anthropology. Her installations, sculpture and photographs have also been shown at Centre A International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, the Western Front, the Ranger Station Art Gallery and at the Banff Centre for the Arts, where she was a participant of the Informal Architecture Residency Program in 2004.

Gailan's pottery can be found in collections throughout North America, including the Doris Shadbolt Collection at the Helen and Morris Belkin Gallery at the University of British Columbia, and continues to be in demand at design stores, galleries and craft fairs locally and abroad.

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about gailan's ceramics

Gailan Ngan works in both stoneware and earthenware. Her pieces are created by a wheel-thrown and hand-altered process, and are fired in both electric and gas kilns. Recently, Gailan's ceramics have been utilizing a rare Yukon clay and glazes made from volcanic ash from the Okanagan, which give her pots their distinctive tones and textures. Her palette of glazes consists of a stone matte-white, speckled blue, mottled green, and pure, shiny black, as well as three earthenware green glazes - all created to enhance the forms of the work. She continues to experiment with glazes created from local materials the artist herself has collected, including local rocks, clays and ashes.

Her ceramics blend a playful, sculptural energy with crisp, functional design. Her tableware includes an ongoing series of meditatively simple bowls, plates and cups, as well as her new “wobble pots,” footless, kinetic pottery that rocks gently, but safely, on your table. Designed to be stacked, these sets work as a unified sculpture when not in use.

Gailan Ngan's ceramics present a contemporary, conceptual twist to the age-old art of pottery. Combining a keen interest in visual art and experimentation with a steadfast respect for everyday practicality, these beautiful, minimal pots are the product of an artist's enquiring mind into the mysteries of form and space.

artist statement

In my work I attempt to create ceramics that are functional in everyday life without forgoing the desire for aesthetic and sensual beauty. My process is influenced by my friends and family, food and eating, travel and research, and I take pleasure in imbuing my work with a sense of play.

My ceramics practice has evolved alongside my interest and involvement in visual art. The sculptures, installations and pinhole photography I've been working on, all involve a fascination with space and environment, tactility and sensual awareness which carries over into my pots.

The long, long tradition of ceramics is a constant source of interest for me. The studies of the history of pottery, my own Asian heritage and learning the craft from my father has infused my working process with a sense of my own place within this tradition, something that is constantly exciting and inspiring.