Evelyn Albrow’s practice is inspired by contemporary and historical utopias, both spiritual and secular, ranging from Beguinages (founded in the 1200s) to everyday communes like the Maison de Babayagas (set up in 2014 in Paris). Her ceramics tell stories of matriarchal utopias, with each piece showing a dreamy world inhabited by monsters, matrons, saints, and goddesses meeting on celestial planes; through this Evelyn explore ideas around community, solidarity, and feminism.

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In 1568, a book of proverbs published in Antwerp claimed that ‘One woman makes a din, two women a lot of trouble, three an annual market, four a quarrel, five an army, and against six the Devil himself has no weapon’... This scene represents a moment of calm before going to battle.

I was finishing this charger at the end of January over Imbolc, the day belonging to Saint Brigid, Goddess of the Hearth. Known to preside over midwifery, poetry, crafts and ironwork, her name means 'fiery arrow'. She’s a fitting namesake for this scene: an alchemical workshop in which weapons are forged. Axes, arrowheads, and gloves with sharp metal talons (inspired by a real Victorian self-defence glove). A small yellow-haired man, the reminder of a persistent threat, is bound and ready to be tipped into the cauldron. The workshop shelves reference the Voynich manuscript (an illustrated codex believed to reveal late mediaeval gynaecological beliefs and sex secrets) and a very fun 18th-century female urinal with her lover's eye painted on the base with the words ''Ha! I see you, little rascal." The table is scattered with Calendula flowers, known for their anti-inflammatory and menstruation-regulating properties. Joan of Arc figures on the wall as an emblem of the female warrior.

Inspiration for the piece came from Charterhouse Coventry, a Carthusian monastery which has large, rare mediaeval wall paintings and Tudor ‘black and white’ murals. I also drew inspiration from a 15th-century Rhenish painting of a nude young witch in funny pointy clogs called ‘Love Magic’ (artist unknown), an image of a good friend who's just given birth, and Remedios Varo’s veiled figure from ‘Embroidering the Earth's Mantle’.

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Painted and glazed stoneware.

2026