Encounters in the workshops: Reconsidering pattern, plot and space of Horezu pottery

This article focuses on the case of Horezu pottery, considering the connections between craft continuity, history, heritage and practice. It draws on a wider body of research in which I am revisiting the 1957 collection of Romanian folk art at the Horniman Museum in London. In this context, I am researching the contemporary responses to the collection and the stories folk potters tell about the process and product of craftwork in the past and today. In this discussion, it is demonstrated that a focus on the traditional design from the perspective of the workshop provides nuanced insights on the artefacts and the myriad of relationships in which they come into being. Themes of relationships between object patterns, the social production of craft and the potters’ taskscapes were invoked during the conversations. Exploring the context of the pattern, life history and space in which Horezu pottery emerges, allows reconsideration of the wide range of activities and structures involved in the making of this craft. It is suggested that certain narratives and material practices triumph over others. The attention on specific stories as well the wider contexts of practice offers a potential to reimagine the Horezu artefacts in ethnographic and museum contexts.