Tessy’s exploration into nonfunctional clay forms began some years ago. Her first exhibitions were about architecturally inspired structures and were mostly simple geometric forms, which is no surprise given that she originally wanted to study architecture before she was convinced to take up painting at UP Fine Arts. Her interest in painting eventually evolved into a new direction: ceramics. For the past 40 years, she and her husband Jon have been pioneering the path for a whole generation of studio potters.

Beginning with her exhibit Cornucopia in 2001 she moved in a new direction. During a snorkeling experience in Palawan she was struck by the diversity and complexity of life underwater -- not just sheer beauty and color but also by the repetitive patterns and structure growing out of the corals, rocks, and sea floor. In the following years she studied and absorbed natural form from other sources such as cacti, succulents, flowers, and grasses. This produced 3 consecutive solo exhibitions: Cornucopia, My Garden, and Aianthous. In all of these exhibitions growth and pattern were her main concern.

Pettyjohn’s choice materials are stoneware and porcelain. These clays, often favored by modern potters, require high temperature firing and produce an amazing range of colors and textures, not unlike those found in nature. They can convey both the biological (such as cacti and coral), and geological (stones and landscape), as stoneware is coarse and earthy, and porcelain fine and colorful. They are opposites in a way.

The common thread in all these exhibits, apart from pattern and color, was the way the structures appeared or blossomed out of another simpler form like a stem or a vase or sometimes the cover of a jar. She was still interested in the vestiges of function, however it was the contrast that seemed to appeal. Complex form and color appearing from plain lifeless surfaces and finding a sort of niche; porcelain appearing out of stoneware.

For Continuing Growth she has stepped a little further beyond the progression and has moved away from the vases; the growths appear out of simpler forms that could be biological, geological, or even man-made, as though the vegetation begins to appear in the detritus of an abandoned world. “Life will find a way” as the mathematician Ian Malcolm said in Jurassic Park. The patterns are now moving up the wall. Although the artist says this might be the last show in the series it will be interesting to see if she moves even further away down the road to abstraction in coming shows.

Words by Jon Pettyjohn

Tessy Pettyjohn (b. 1948) is a renowned pioneer of Philippine pottery, clay art, and sculpture. Starting her craft in the late 1970s, she has had many shows both here and abroad in her long career. Although she has retired from teaching, she now concentrates on doing her own work for exhibits at her Laguna workshop studio. She continues to explore the use of indigenous Philippine clays, pigments, and minerals for making high fire ceramics and glazes. 

Tessy and her husband Jon are at the forefront of ceramic arts in the Philippines. They have developed over many years, masterpieces, which focus heavily on the use of uniquely Filipino materials.