Rory Dobner — Making stories come alive

Rory Dobner captures mischief stories from his imagination with ink and then through ceramics he makes those stories come alive.

THE STORY

I’d been drawing ink work, and I ended up with a huge library of ink drawings but all the sketchbooks were on my shelf in my studio and no one's ever seen them. Then I was like, I should do something with them. That’s when I started to print them onto object, so other people could see them. 

BEGINNING

— Your interest in ink, where has it come from?

—Probably from reading books as a child, like Winnie-the-Pooh, Paddington Bear, Alice in Wonderland and those books had a lot of texts and just little ink drawings on every other page and I’ve always thought it’s so clever that you can just do a few black lines and creates the whole world. That’s why I love the black and white, because it’s so simple.

Since 12 years old I have started with ink drawings. I traveled different countries and I draw anything, probably every day.

I finished studying at St. Martins doing sculpture and I continued to sell it. When I moved into a different studio, I didn’t have as much space, the sculptures were too big and I could not fit them through the door. Then I was like, maybe I’ll do some drawings in the meantime until I find somewhere else, but this is when the drawings suddenly took off and so I never did any more sculpture, I just continued doing this.

THE QUEEN BEE STORY

SUCCESS

I actually honestly thought at the beginning maybe no one would be interested in them because they are just my ideas but then it became very popular very quickly fortunately.

EXPANSION

The white of a ceramic is like a paper I draw on, so the transition is not so different but also it’s the black on the ceramic that is so shiny and rich. So something about it makes it come alive. 

— Why have you not stayed with paper only but moved into ceramics?

Because it is limiting to only being a picture. As soon as I have mugs, it’s very special and people are saying, “Every morning I wake up and I have my coffee with your mug. And I look at it and look out of the window and I start my day, every day, looking at your work.” You can’t compare that to be in a gallery or having a picture hanging on the wall. It’s bringing your art into a personal space, into real life.

OWN

I wouldn’t want to be an illustrator because I’d had to illustrate other people’s stories and I don’t want to do that, I have my own stories. So I want to illustrate my own stories.

SUPERPOWER

This moment from my dialogue with Rory is a great example of how we do not notice what feels natural. Our biggest personal power is in what feels ordinary to us.

IMAGINATION

I realise to be as efficient as possible at drawing — rather than sketching lots of different sketches I just stare at the page, I design the character just from imagination and I move it around, I can stretch it, change the hats, anything. As soon as I have it finished I just draw around it. So it saves me a lot of time. Because I can just project it. 

QUEST

Behind every letter there is the whole story, things to search, there is a challenge, I try to put a lot of thoughts into doing it.

DREAM WORLD 

It’s making a story but then actually the story doesn’t exist, it’s just to make the characters. 

MASTERPIECE

The cat with the monocle is most well-known one. He is recognised around the world. I don’t know why. I try to think why. I think it’s something to do with the eyes, the way he is really looking into you. He is not just looking, he is looking into you. Also, his expression is very thoughtful like he has an intelligence but the lines of the face they are going outwards. They are pulling your attention towards his eyes. It’s getting all your attention. He is at peace. He is quite quiet. He is unusual, he is not very happy, he is not very sad, he is very like the Mona Lisa. It is mystery. He is curious. Maybe your brain can’t quite understand.

MEANINGS

There are so many meanings in your brand, how do you convey them?

-Art should stand alone by itself and be able to communicate by itself.

-But I would never be able to guess all of those meanings!?

-Well, it’s up to you to look harder in the world !

QUALITY

Making something of a special quality is a value. If there is a fire in your house, I hope you would take one of my things with you. You’d be sad if you lost it.

THE BOOK