Vessels of Life – Lombok Earthenware

Jean McKinnon is an accomplished artist in her own right, a student of traditional Southeast Asian art forms and a consultant in craft development. Her interest in indigenous art started when as a student of Fine Arts at the University of California, Davis, she studied the art and craft forms of many countries. She made New Zealand her base and it was from there that she commenced her travels through the Pacific Islands and Southeast Asia. Jean has worked in Solomon Island villages, lived in rural North Auckland, raised children in Fiji, pursued her interest in craft over a long period resident in Thailand and exhibited her paintings and ceramic sculptural work in venues stretching from Wellington to Chiang Mai. Between 1988 and 1991 she managed the setting up and first three and half years of the Indonesia-New Zealand Lombok Craft Project, working to strengthen traditional techniques and develop new market outlets for Sasak pottery. Since then she has curated an exhibition of Sasak pots at the Dowse Art Museum in Hutt City, New Zealand, and carried out full time research into the historical meaning, contemporary use and development potential of the indigenous crafts of the Sasak.