Born and raised in the West Midlands, Katie Smith is a ceramic artist now based in South London. She holds a 1st class degree in BA(Hons) Decorative Arts from Nottingham Trent University as well as a first-class MA in Designer Maker from University of the Arts London. 

 

After graduating, Smith was shortlisted for the Cockpit Arts Radcliffe Emerging Makers Award in 2023 and had a solo exhibition ‘Languish’ in the craft space at ASPEX Gallery Portsmouth. Smith has shown nationally across the UK, including high profile shows such as London Art Fair and London Design Festival with Ruup & Form gallery, as well as selective exhibitions like Made in the Middle and The Gallery at Green & Stone Summer Exhibition. She was one of ten creatives selected by Slancha Gallery to represent Birmingham’s creative culture at The Design Guild Dinner in collaboration with Soho House in 2025. Smith’s practice also extends into pedagogy as she currently runs the ceramic curriculum in a leading London independent school. 

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Smith's practice centres on the creation of hand-built vessel forms. Using a research-through-practice approach, she creates organic, sculptural ceramics that investigate materiality, tactility, and the relationship between process and form. Inspired by folk crafts, ancient ceramics, maximalist aesthetics, and natural structures, her work exists between functional object and sculpture.

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She uses the vessel as an indirect representation of the body, drawing parallels between ceramic forms and experiences of femininity within a patriarchal society. Her rounded, bodily forms challenge ideals of perfection often imposed upon women, exploring vulnerability, sensitivity, and the physical and emotional traces carried within the body over time.

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Working intuitively, Smith allows the clay to guide aspects of the making process through slumping, warping, and deformation. Visible coils, folds, dimples, and finger marks remain embedded within her surfaces, preserving evidence of touch and emphasising the physical dialogue between maker and material. Gestural markings, derived from her paintings, reference bodily movement, textures found in nature, and perceived ‘imperfections’ such as stretch marks, folds, and scarring.

Through tactile surfaces and precarious forms, Smith explores how materials can hold memory, movement, and human experience. Her vessels balance fragility with structural permanence, creating forms that feel simultaneously vulnerable, bodily, and enduring.