For 30 years my friend and colleague Morgen Hall, who has died aged 55, was a central presence in the vibrant Cardiff ceramics and arts scene. She was one of the most skilful, passionate and well-loved potters of her generation.
Born in Roseville, California, she moved to Scotland as a child when her parents, Marlene and Martin Hall, bought a small farm. They had been restaurateurs in Mendocino, northern California, and Morgen inherited from them a lifelong love of food and a concern for the manner of its production.
In the early 1980s she worked as an assistant to the potters Ian Pirie and Joe Finch and attended Gray’s School of Art, Aberdeen. She went to Wales in 1983 to study for her MA ceramics degree in what was then the faculty of art and design at Cardiff Institute of Higher Education (now Cardiff Metropolitan University). After her MA she began to exhibit widely, producing work from her studio at the Chapter arts centre in Cardiff. It was there that she met the artist Robert Kennedy, and they married in 1988, although Morgen kept her maiden name.
She soon had work accepted for shows in the Barbican centre and Liberty, London, and for three years running in the early 1990s she showed at Chelsea Crafts Fair, with great success. At the Royal National Eisteddfod of Wales she won first prize in the domestic pottery section in 1986, 1987 and 1988, and again in 1990, when she was also awarded the Craft Masterpiece gold medal. In 2005 she won the Creative Wales award, which enabled her to pursue her interest in new technology. She combined this effortlessly with traditional handcraft techniques.
Her pots were made, more often than not, with particular foods in mind: banana bowls, cabaret tea services, couscous dishes. Taking slices of fruit and vegetables, she would use microscopes and scanners to create intricate designs and motifs and then employ laser and cutter plotters to produce the stencils for the decorations on her work. Her skills in throwing and turning on the wheel and applying surface detail on her pots were second to none. There was an authenticity about the pots and their maker that is rarely encountered. Her work is represented in, among other places, the permanent collections of the National Museum Wales and the Victoria and Albert museum.
For many years she taught at Cardiff Open Art School and was a popular tutor, the students benefiting from her years of practical experience and her incisive critiques, as well as her boundless optimism. Cardiff School of Art and Design is creating an annual Morgen Hall award on the BA ceramics programme.
Eight years ago, Morgen was diagnosed with breast cancer. Even when seriously ill, she never lost her ability to encourage and inspire.
She is survived by her husband, her mother, her brothers, Rand and Dana, and her sister, Glory.
