For our November mixed exhibition Terroir and Texture, we sat down with wood artisan Laurence Moracchini to talk about finding imperfection, how she began woodcarving and why she’s stopped making functional objects.    

Laurence is one of the artists featured in our exhibition ‘Terroir & Texture.’ Her objects are made in collaboration with each piece of wood, enhancing its unique character: its patterns, its quirks. Working with local, reclaimed wood brings discovery and controlled accident. There is a dialogue with each piece; the design of the final form developing as the wood talks to her. She is showing a new body of work, made especially for this show, which disrupt and blur the line between the functional and decorative. After a long time making functional objects, Laurence is now focusing on pushing the material to something beyond functionality: creating sculptural pieces which are playful and tensile. 

Laurence is joined in this show by ceramicist Ella Porter. Both artisans respond to their material’s fragility, enhancing the aspects of ‘imperfection’ inherent to both wood and clay. Together, their work creates a contemplative exhibition which explores the intersection between natural materials and the hand of the maker. 

The exhibition runs until the 17th November in our tasting room. 

What led you to becoming a wood artisan?  

I have worked with wood all my life, since I was a little girl growing up in Corsica.  My dad worked with metal, and I used to play with wood at his workshop, my uncles teaching me to whittle on their lunchbreaks. I originally wanted to study cabinet making but, in my time, it wasn’t very common for girls, so I had to channel my fascination with making and wood into perfecting my own craft. I moved to Mexico and lived there for 10 years, meeting lots of creative people and honing my practice.  

What do you love about wood?  

I feel a communion with wood. When you work with it, all of your senses are activated. I make very textured pieces, which invite people’s touch. I always say to people when they view my work, ‘I can see you touching them with your eyes, please touch them with your hands!’  

I really enjoy working with local, reclaimed wood because there is a dialogue. I will start off with one idea and end up with something totally different, because the wood talks to you. I’m excited about what I will find when I carve – I am looking for imperfection. I don’t consider myself a wood turner, who looks for perfection; I search for the knot, the cracks, the blight and I make these irregularities a central part of my pieces. A lot of the time the wood will split as I carve, so I use burnished copper splints to mend the crack – this centralises the ‘blemish’ and makes it beautiful. I enjoy this opposition between damage and repair, pain and healing.  

Can you take us through your process.  

I often start off with a clear idea of the form the piece should take. I discover these shapes by looking at the wood, seeing what kind of object the material suggests. I use gouges or electric tools to shape large pieces and hand-tools such as rasps for smaller ones. I also carve by using fire, burning away parts of the wood. It’s a very physical process; you throw your whole body into it.  

Once the form is completed, I decide how I will finish the piece. I charr my pieces most of the time. Charring stops the decay of wood, giving it a second life. It also makes it more resilient, as it stops you staining the wood accidentally with the natural oils and dirt from your hands. The texture charring gives is very beautiful – it exacerbates the grain and makes light play beautifully on the surface. However, I don’t always charr my pieces. If there are beautiful textures and patterns in the wood, such as spalting, I will leave the piece uncharred, finishing it simply with oil and wax.  

I don’t like working with wood that isn’t local to me, believing we should be using what the environment immediately provides. So too, I don’t like using pre-made products to finish my pieces. I make my own oil and wax mixture which is completely natural. I prefer using wax as I don’t like overly shiny pieces. For me, pieces polished to a high shine take something from the wood, whereas a matte finish celebrates the natural grain and texture.  

You also have a painting practice, with one of your paintings ‘Underground Texture’ featured in this exhibition alongside your wood objects. How does your painting practice feed into your wood-working one?  

As with my wooden objects, texture is a key part of my painting practice. I like to replicate or physically use the textures I find in nature, using salt, soil, ashes and marble dust in many of my pieces. My paintings all have an element of mixed media, and my process is similar to how I work with wood: I like to build up layers on my surface and then carve back into them.  

The thematic preoccupations are the same: damage and repair, darkness and light, decline and renewal, trauma and resilience. All my work is a celebration of the broken.  

Talk to us about the pieces you have made for ‘Terroir & Texture.’  

Included in the exhibition is a body of work which examines the relationship between the functional and the decorative. I’m currently going through a journey of transition from the functional objects that I made for so long. I have turned bowls and platters for years; now I want to focus on pushing the material towards the sculptural. I want people to ask the question ‘is it a bowl, or is it a piece of art and is there a difference?’ I find this tension very interesting.  

A piece which demonstrates this agitation of the functional is Ash Vase with Window. The piece is the shape of a vase, with an opening at the top suggesting it could be filled with dried flowers. Yet the circular opening at the bottom disrupts the piece from fulfilling this function, making it a disruptive, sculptural object.  

Terroir & Texture runs until the 17th November. To see this contemplative exhibition before it closes, be sure to visit us this Thursday – Sunday, 12 – 5 pm. Laurence and Ella’s work is available to view and purchase via our tasting room and through our ONLINE GALLERY.