Edmund de Waal

de Waal was born in Nottingham, UK, in 1964. The British ceramic artist wrote a memoir entitled The Hare with Amber Eyes (2010), which chronicles his journey to understand his inheritance of a collection of Netsuke, small Japanese carvings made of ivory or wood. De Waal’s family hails from the Ephrussi clan, a prosperous Jewish banking family whose prominence came about in 19th-century Odessa, Paris, and Vienna. The Ephrussi art collection is now widely dispersed in museums and private collections, with items still coming to auction.

The artist has been working at the wheel since childhood. Geoffrey Whitling taught de Waal the art of pottery at The King’s School, Canterbury. When he was 17 years old, the artist deferred his acceptance to Cambridge University to fulfill a two-year-long apprenticeship under Whitling. In 1986, de Waal graduated from Trinity Hall, Cambridge, with high honors. After his graduation, the artist moved to the Welsh borders to make inexpensive pots, and then to Sheffield to work with porcelain.

De Waal has received various awards and honors throughout his career. In 1998, he received a British Council Award, and in 1996, he received an Individual Artists Award from the London Arts Board. In 2011, he was awarded an OBE from the British government for his contribution to the arts, and became a trustee at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The artist currently lives and works in London, UK.