Ambrose Burne | Artist Blacksmith

Ambrose’s blacksmithing career started 10 years ago when he completed a training course at HCT (Herefordshire College of Technology). From this technical foundation he developed his making skills as a journeyman blacksmith in London, where he had the opportunity to be involved in a variety of challenging large-scale projects. As his capabilities as a maker progressed he became increasingly eager to make work that expressed his ideas about the potential of forged metal used within a contemporary context. To realise his creative ambitions, he returned to education (and Hereford), completing the Artist Blacksmithing degree course at HCA (Hereford College of Arts.)

CAs an artist blacksmith, Ambrose’s work fuses contemporary artistic ideas and design principles with traditional craft techniques. Forged steel appeals to him as a medium because of the diverse ways the material can be applied; steel is a physically strong material that can be used to create robust and durable structure and is malleable so can be manipulated into the most varied forms whilst retaining its strength.

The visual idea that underpins his designs relates to growth and movement in natural form, the way it is visually expressed within the structure of plants, shells and skeletons in particular. He uses drawing to analyse structures in order to find forms and lines that can be the starting point for a design. To translate these drawings into steel he seeks out methods of manipulating the metal: extruding, bending, punching, that will emphasise the essential qualities of the original form. Rather than creating a replica of the original form in metal, he aims to borrow and decipher its energy.