Simon Lee Dicker

#Repost @osrprojects ・・・ As part of the ‘After Session’ with Hettie Judah hosted by OSR Projects, Simon Lee Dicker along with Chantelle Henocq and Susie Clark will be giving a short insight into his current work. Simon Lee Dicker’s practice is rooted in an ongoing inquiry into landscape and the traces, material, historical, and emotional, that human activity leaves on the natural world. Working across ceramics, installation, moving image, writing, drawing and digital 3D modelling, he explores matter in states of flux and the permeable boundaries between post-industrial terrain, ecological processes, and the more-than-human world. In 2011 Simon co-founded OSR Projects with Chantelle Henocq: an artist-run organisation that connects people through artist-led activity, exploring new ways to see, hear, feel and think. From OSR Projects’ base in rural Somerset, they produce ambitious, playful, socially and critically-engaged art projects, placing people at the centre of artistic activity through creative partnerships, community collaboration, and diverse modes of engagement. Where: The New Inn, West Coker, BA22 9BD When: Wednesday 20 May, 11am-1pm 👆 Tickets available in bio 👆 Tickets £5-£7.50  Artwork titles: Rudera - of the rubble, 2026 (film still) The five sisters, 2026 woodfired ceramic press mould with Cornish granite, Lothian shale and Coker wood ash When a thought becomes like a wire in the mind (SE), 2026 Pencil on paper @simonleedicker @osrprojects @odartsfest @hettiejudah @thenewinnwestcoker

Ribbons of gold and yellow flow against the glowing ember bed No cold black spots Fuelled and stoked Alive Drawn into the chamber and rising out of the chimney Not too much smoke Quick, quick, don’t panic. I create a map of the spaces in between the obstacles, singed into the kill shelf. I break free of the fibrous insulation creating a new Oxfordshire landscape in soot on the white brick of the chimney. I slip past the mostly cylindrical objects, each transforming from mud to stone, a shimmer of glaze and a scorch of flame. Outside we do an impression of firing cones. Our backs arch backwards arms outstretched. My toasties aren’t happy balanced on balls of Wadding. They lean and rest on others for security. In the heat of the kiln the bond becomes permanent, an unplanned coupling between strangers. Thanks to all the wonderful humans I met and became attached to @oxfordkilns :)) @lala_leoparty @olenaslyesarenko @pots.by.lizzie @wongmemories @raykhanlaingceramics @sal.drummond @artandlifeasone @changcreations @wawalyy And for the generous support and guidance from @robin.a.wilson @ceramica_ekta 🙌 …and an unexpected gift from Svend Bayer 🥣

I came here so I was in reach of the Lothian shale mounds. Known as ‘bings’ these mountains of spent shale were re-articulated as an artwork by John Latham in 1975. Neat conceptualism meets land art- reframing the labour of generations. First you hear the skylarks, then you hear the scramblers. Now protected monuments and full of life. I went on a blind assent and spiralling decent following Dante, TS Eliot and Cal Flyn. Last night, I watched the film Architecton by Victor Kossakovsky. Scenic aerial bypasses of ruined and deserted concrete tower blocks. Traces of human life made visible through the interior decoration now worn on the outside of the buildings. Other images of rocks colliding and tumbling. Cracking and crushing, more liquid than solid. These scenes have stayed in my dreams. I was speaking with another artist here who has a deep interest in these things. Working with digital data to estimate how much rubble has been created in Gaza. And talking about how human body parts are part of this conglomeration. I pause - and draw a line between the freckles on my forearm - It makes the shape of a triangle. I’ve been using a cheese toastie machine as a press mould. Glaze made from Lothian shale, Cornish granite, ash and wood chips from Somerset. @eswsculpture REACH Scotland residency Week 4: Thank you to all wonderful artists, curators and team at ESW + everyone else I’ve met along the way for making this such a dream of a residency 🙌 @uisttttcorrrigannnn @sculptureedin @meabh.breathnach @samer_abdelnour @mellamine @jamie____fitzpatrick @david_lemm #LauraSimpson 🤩

Rolling little balls of Alumina-hydrate and China Clay to stop the glaze sticking to the kiln shelves ••••• I show the spheres in the plastic tub to the five sisters on the wall ^^^^^ The telegram I received shows that the holes in R.Mutt’s 1917 ‘The Fountain’ are in the shape of a triangle - but later versions are in the shape of a cross and a circle. You can’t re-produce a ready-made. Walking off the mound through the back of an industrial estate, I find the Gateway to the Bings. Hundreds of tire tracks across a muddy field. Pools of water catching and reflecting the crisp blue sky. Back in the city, I climb Arthur’s seat with the wrong shoes. Everyone speaking French. I can’t see the bings through the haze of the winter sun. The summit is swarming - all searching for a view and a place to rest their hearts. @eswsculpture REACH Scotland residency Week 3: Another fantastic week at ESW 🙌. Thanks @mellamine for organising an intimate screening including my WIP (Rudera- of the rubble), alongside your film ‘Sounding Line’ and great work by @maryamhaddadi.films and @studio.sumlacs . A perfect Friday afternoon studio visit with the wonderful Sorcha Carey 🤩 @collective_edin

Some toasted treats from the kiln. First firing: Error code 5 Clay, plaster and stone collide. Ideas bubble like pimpled butsu-butsu pots. I walk between two signs. One asks me to question my own morality. The other tells me I’m being watched. I’m trying to cut a path, using my art as a bill hook, vaseline and pillow. Another sign tells me to not climb the artwork. Next to the sculpture is broken tree alive with bracket fungus. I make my way up and around, spiralling to the top of the stump the using the natural ledges. When I reach the top I get an unexpected view to the largest of the shale mounds. Sitting under the Lomond hills and brooding clouds the unnatural monument has been with me the whole time. @eswsculpture REACH Scotland residency Week 2: thanks to all at ESW for the brilliant support in and out of the studio and workshops. @nataliamaria_p and #LauraSimpson for a wonderful studio visit and a great afternoon with young creatives from the ‘orbit’ programme run by @jupiter.artland 💫

There should be enough silica, alumina and flux in Cornish granite and Lothian Shale to make a glaze. It will probably be Brown, but maybe a beautiful Brown made of all the other colours. I pull the contents of my van through the workshops and corridors on a small yellow trolley. Up and down the lift. I like that I can pump up the platform even though I don’t really need to. I pump it up. Boxes of tools, paper, pencils, a projector and a speaker. A folder with photos of previous work to make me feel at home. Two lithographic Stones from Preston that weigh around the same as bass rock. A gift of a small sculpture from Crosby made of two petal shaped leaves of paper pulp held together with an elastic band and friendship. Boxes of dust and rubble. Crates full of bisque fired forms ready to glaze. I get them out and the room looks more like an experimental boulangerie than a Studio. I like it. @eswsculpture REACH Scotland residence Week 1: Huge thanks to all lovely folk at ESW for such a warm welcome. What a week!

Please note: Whilst every care is taken to maintain sanity and composure whilst navigating life as an artist ~ a stable and care-free existence cannot be guaranteed. I’ve spent the past couple of months waking up early, moving my body to get the endorphins moving before heading to the studio to make (and often break) work - that nobody asked me to do. I know this freedom is a privilege ~ I’m holding my nerve ~and can see a gap in the clouds. Here are some snippets from the studio. #contemporaryart #termsandconditions #artistled #gapintheclouds

Mica and quartz piled up to the sky. The pyramids of the near West. Some naked and exposed, others dressed in green. Rain pouring down, flushing clay out of the rocks. It was a week of big moons and wild swims, rain, rocks, clay and fire on the Waste Materials and Wood firing course led by the fabulous @rosanna_martin_ @__brickfield__ 🙌 So good to start developing new work in this incredible landscape… and in such good company. #contemporaryart #ceramics #wastematerials #woodfired #claycountry #cornwall

Saturday 9 August (12-5pm ) is the final day to catch The Flatlands 2023 ( film only) as part of the wonderful EOP summer camp @eprjcts Exploring contemporary ideas of entropy, de-architecturalisation and edgelands in the rural landscape this work pays attention to what is airbrushed out of a collective imagination of the rural with a focus on what lies in the peripheral vision. Originally shown at Arnolfini as part of A Weekend at Hotel Palenque #rural #edglands #contemporaryart #artised

Delighted to be in such good company 🙏@artistsdrawings.mag 🙌 #1 ・・・ The first issue of Artists’ Drawings is now on sale at artistsdrawings.co.uk! (Currently only shipping within the UK) The issue explores relationships between drawing and sculpture through forty drawings (broadly defined) selected from an open call for submissions and museum collections. Alongside these drawings are three short commissioned texts—by Stu Burke, Olivia Bax and Matt Page—and an excerpt from Paul Valéry’s writing on drawing.  Contributors @cos_____ahmet @spoorofbotch @jennirope @laura_fitzgerald__ @benroweartist @angel_greenham @g.tyler.honn @stuburkeart @i_am_not_ruolan @is____ca @followthesun_studio @katetookaphoto @bbencoleman @jayottewellart @charlie__franklin @simonleedicker @rachmortlock machinicprotocols @watercolor_by_mykola @victoriaemilysharples @katyamora_c @olivia_bax_ @matthewjpage #ArtistsDrawingsMagazine

Thank you to all who helped make this work 🙌 @odartsfest team and everyone who visited 🙌 Great photos @katydocking #Repost @odartsfest ・・・ SIMON LEE DICKER⁠ Red Hot Haystacks⁠ ⁠ Using a combination of black light and wild meadow grass, Red Hot Haystacks explores ideas around the unseen environmental impact of human activity through a story of nuclear testing in the 1960s. High levels of radiation were reported on the coasts each side of the Pentland Firth that separates mainland Scotland from the Orkney archipelago. The seas proved too treacherous to complete any survey, but later, soil particles from haystacks contaminated by atmospheric nuclear testing, were described geologists as Red Hot.⁠ ⁠ Simon Lee Dicker is an artist based in south Somerset whose work explores a discordant relationship with landscape and human-made marks on the natural world. He describes an artistic practice that examines matter in a state of flux as being ‘restless’.⁠ ⁠ Dicker’s recent exhibitions include temporary sculptural installations with ceramics such as See-an-enemy in Lisbon made from chalk, unfired clay and ceramics, and The Flatlands at the Arnolfini in Bristol, a large-scale sculptural installation of a tyre stack and film inspired by Robert Smithson’s Hotel Palenque. His work exists alongside a practice in creative writing with drawing that continues to inform his ideas. @simonleedicker ⁠ ⁠ VENUE⁠ 6. Coker Court, East Coker⁠ ⁠ Photography @katydocking ⁠ ⁠ ⁠Od Arts Festival – Thinking in Circles took place 23-25 May 2025 organised by OSR Projects and supported by Arts Council England @aceagrams and we thank National Lottery players @HeritageFundUK ⁠ ⁠

Final week to see my work (vessel(sherd)) as part of ‘Food beyond the plate’ exhibition @rammuseum As part of my time at RAMM in Exeter I had the pleasure of running a series of workshops in partnership with Hikmat Devon, who support families and individuals from minority ethnic backgrounds, including new arrivals and refugees. Participants created ceramic vessels inspired by collections at RAMM. The project included people from diverse backgrounds including China, Southeast Asia, Libya, Egypt and Afghanistan. The workshops explored the links between pottery vessels, food and place. Through the process, we collectively explored the similarities between ceramic vessels, used for food and drink, from around the world and across time periods. The participants' work has been photographed and 3D digital models made, which have been added to RAMM's digital collection. The original artworks have been returned to the people who made them. Workshop participants were also very generous in sharing comments and personal stories with the museum which will also be added as part of a trial of new digital labels in RAMM's Making History gallery. "Especially in the pottery, when you look at it, it gives you the feeling that there is lots of similarity all over the world. You think that it's just us that make it, but when you see it in the museum you think, oh, lots of people have the same ideas. You see how similar everyone is. We have similarities more than differences." —Hikmat participant This work is part of the ‘Food beyond the plate’ exhibition at RAMM until 29 June 2025. Commissioned by Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery, Exeter City Council, 2024/5, as part of the Dynamic Collections programme funded by @national lottery heritage fund photos_ JImW