Emmanuel Cooper (12 December 193821 January 2012)"Emmanuel Cooper obituary"
''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'', 30 January 2012. was a British

studio potter Studio pottery is pottery made by professional and amateur artists or artisans working alone or in small groups, making unique items or short runs. Typically, all stages of manufacture are carried out by the artists themselves.Emmanuel Cooper, ...

, advocate for

LGBT rights Rights affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people vary greatly by country or jurisdiction—encompassing everything from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the death penalty for homosexuality. Notably, , 33 ...

and writer on arts and crafts.

Biography

Born in

Pilsley, North East Derbyshire Pilsley is a village and civil parish in the district of North East Derbyshire in the county of Derbyshire, England. It is located near to the town of Chesterfield. At the 2011 Census the population was 3,487. Pilsley has an Anglican church, ...

, Cooper studied at the

University for the Creative Arts The University for the Creative Arts is a specialist art and design university in the south of England. It was formed in 2005 as University College for the Creative Arts at Canterbury, Epsom, Farnham, Maidstone and Rochester when the Kent Inst ...

. He also achieved a PhD degree at

Middlesex University Middlesex University London (legally Middlesex University and abbreviated MDX) is a public research university in Hendon, northwest London, England. The name of the university is taken from its location within the historic county boundaries ...

. He was a member of the

Crafts Council The Crafts Council is the national development agency for contemporary craft in the United Kingdom, and is funded by Arts Council England. History The Crafts Advisory Committee was formed in 1971 to advise the Minister for the Arts, David Eccles ...

and the editor of ''Ceramic Review''. Since 1999, he was visiting Professor of Ceramics and Glass at the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design university in the United Kingdom. It offe ...

. He was the author of many books on ceramics, including his definitive biography of

Bernard Leach Bernard Howell Leach (5 January 1887 – 6 May 1979), was a British studio potter and art teacher. He is regarded as the "Father of British studio pottery". Biography Early years (Japan) Leach was born in Hong Kong. His mother Eleanor (née ...

that was published in 2003 (

Yale University Press Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day, and became an official department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and operationally autonomous. , Yale Universi ...

), and was also the editor of ''The Ceramics Book'', published in 2006. In the early 1970s, he was also a cofounder of the

Gay Left Gay Left was a collective of gay men and a journal of the same name which they published every six months in London between the years 1975 and 1980. It was formed after the dissolution of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) and the Gay Marxist Gro ...

collective, and remained a prominent

campaigner throughout his life. He also published several studies of LGBT art, including ''The Sexual Perspective'' and ''Fully Exposed: The Male Nude in Photography''. As a potter, Cooper's work falls into one of two general forms. In the first his vessels are heavily glazed in a volcanic form. The vessels, as a result of this heavy glazing, derive a lot of their appeal from their varied and uneven textures. In their most simple form they are very reminiscent of work by

Lucie Rie Dame Lucie Rie, (16 March 1902 – 1 April 1995) () was an Austrian-born British studio potter. Life Early years and education Lucie Gomperz was born in Vienna, Lower Austria, Austria-Hungary, the youngest child of Benjamin Gomperz, a Jewis ...

. In their more extravagant forms though the vessels can be banded or use incredibly vivid colors to great effect including pink, vibrant yellow and deep reds and blues. His other form of work is much simpler in style using plain glazes, often in egg yolk yellow, occasionally spotted with gold flecks. His work can be found in the

Victoria & Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

, the

National Museum of Scotland The National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, Scotland, was formed in 2006 with the merger of the new Museum of Scotland, with collections relating to Scottish antiquities, culture and history, and the adjacent Royal Scottish Museum (opened in ...

and the

Philadelphia Museum of Art The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMoA) is an art museum originally chartered in 1876 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The main museum building was completed in 1928 on Fairmount, a hill located at the northwest end of the Benjamin Fr ...

, as well as in many

private collection A private collection is a privately owned collection of works (usually artworks) or valuable items. In a museum or art gallery context, the term signifies that a certain work is not owned by that institution, but is on loan from an individual ...

s. He was awarded an OBE for services to art in 2002. Cooper died in London on 21 January 2012.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cooper, Emmanuel 1938 births 2012 deaths People from Pilsley, North East Derbyshire Alumni of the University for the Creative Arts Alumni of Middlesex University English potters English ceramicists English non-fiction writers English biographers English editors Academics of the Royal College of Art Officers of the Order of the British Empire English LGBT rights activists English gay artists English gay writers English male non-fiction writers Gay academics