Phoebe Collings James is one of the most arresting and innovative artists working in contemporary British art today. Born in London in 1987, she is known for her genre-defying work that spans sculpture, ceramics, performance, video, sound, and drawing. What makes her practice stand out is not just her multi-disciplinary approach but her ability to channel deeply personal, political, and spiritual narratives into raw and haunting works of art.
Collings James’s artistic voice resonates with themes of grief, sexuality, Black identity, resistance, and healing, often delivered through materials and methods that challenge both the viewer’s perception and traditional artistic boundaries. She is part of a generation of Black British artists who are rewriting what it means to create meaningful, socially-rooted contemporary art.
Early Life and Education
Phoebe Collings James began her creative life at a young age, modeling at just 13 years old. Although her modeling career brought her into contact with the world of fashion and photography, her deeper interest lay in storytelling and expression through visual art. She later enrolled at Goldsmiths, University of London, where she earned her degree in Fine Art.
Goldsmiths is known for producing boundary-pushing creatives, and Collings James was no exception. Her time at the university helped her cultivate a practice that embraced experimentation, political engagement, and emotional honesty.
A Multi-Disciplinary Practice
One of the most compelling aspects of Phoebe Collings James’s work is her refusal to be boxed into a single medium. Her artistic output spans:
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Ceramics: She uses clay as an emotional and political vessel, creating works that bear the marks of hand-shaping, cracking, and burning. These tactile sculptures serve as containers of memory, pain, and resistance.
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Sound and Performance: Her installations are often accompanied by soundscapes that include poetry, field recordings, and voice fragments—inviting audiences to feel, not just see, her works.
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Video and Drawing: Early in her career, video and drawing played central roles, often as methods to narrate internalized trauma and express feminist ideologies.
Through this layered, immersive approach, Collings James crafts narratives that are not always linear but deeply felt.
The Role of Clay: Ceramics as Political Vessels
Clay has become the centerpiece of Collings James’s recent work. She refers to ceramics as “emotional vessels”—objects that hold the weight of colonial history, personal trauma, and radical joy. Far from polished pottery, her ceramic pieces are often deliberately broken, textured, or unglazed, creating a sense of fragility and resilience.
Her ceramic torsos and vessels explore the human form, ancestral memory, and the intersection of race and gender. They are not simply decorative objects; they speak of the body, spirit, and earth as interconnected entities. Her engagement with clay also has a communal dimension through her Mudbelly initiative, which provides free ceramics classes for Black people in London, reclaiming a space that has historically excluded Black bodies and narratives.
Themes of Identity, Resistance, and Spirituality
Phoebe Collings James’s art deals with themes that are often uncomfortable but necessary. Her work fearlessly touches on:
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Black identity and representation
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Queerness and fluid sexuality
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Colonial legacies and historical trauma
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Spiritual rupture and repair
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Violence—both systemic and personal
In her solo show “A Scratch! A Scratch!” at Camden Art Centre, she created a large-scale installation featuring ceramic torsos, sgraffito wall pieces, and an ambient soundscape. The show drew from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet—particularly Mercutio’s death scene—as a metaphor for emotional wounding and the fine line between pain and performance.
Collings James has noted that she is drawn to “negative capability”—a term coined by poet John Keats—meaning the ability to dwell in uncertainties and doubts. This willingness to sit with unresolved tension gives her work a uniquely introspective and transformative quality.
Mudbelly Teaches: Education as Resistance
In addition to her personal practice, Phoebe Collings James is committed to reshaping access to the arts. She founded Mudbelly Teaches, a free ceramics education program aimed specifically at Black individuals in London. The initiative emerged from her own recognition of how rare and inaccessible ceramic education can be, especially for marginalized communities.
By offering free training and resources, Collings James is making a tangible impact on the art world’s inclusivity. This work reflects her broader artistic philosophy—that healing, transformation, and creativity are communal acts.
International Recognition and Exhibitions
Phoebe Collings James has earned significant critical acclaim. Her work has been exhibited in leading art spaces across Europe and the United States, including:
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Camden Art Centre, London
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SculptureCenter, New York
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Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, Germany
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York Art Gallery, UK
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Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge
In 2024, her exhibition “In Practice” at SculptureCenter in New York presented a body of ceramic work confronting themes of state-sanctioned power, faith, and heresy. The pieces combined abstracted figures and symbols to reflect both resistance and divine intervention.
Her first solo exhibition in Brussels in 2025, titled “At the End of the Small Hours,” showcased new ceramic works that examined time, breath, and the emotional residue of ancestral memory.
Critical Acclaim and Cultural Impact
Collings James is frequently featured in art journals, academic symposia, and fashion media alike. She was selected as one of Apollo Magazine’s “40 Under 40” for Craft, a prestigious list recognizing influential young artists.
Her appearance in Vogue highlighted the intersection of feminism, art, and fashion in her identity. Yet, despite these accolades, she remains rooted in practices that center storytelling, care, and defiance against systemic erasure.
Her ability to navigate both high-concept art institutions and grassroots communities makes her a unique figure in today’s cultural landscape. She represents a bridge between the academy and the street, between ancestral knowledge and contemporary critique.
Personal Reflections: Vulnerability as Power
Perhaps what sets Phoebe Collings James apart most is her emotional transparency. She has spoken openly about how her work is informed by her own grief, sexuality, fears, and joys. This vulnerability doesn’t weaken her voice—it strengthens it. It brings audiences closer to the work, inviting not just observation but participation.
There’s a rawness in her ceramics, a sonic depth in her performances, and a poetic ambiguity in her drawings that resonate deeply in a time where authenticity feels rare. Her creations are not complete without the emotional engagement of those who encounter them.
Why Phoebe Collings James Matters Today
In an era where identity politics are often co-opted or diluted, Phoebe Collings James holds her ground with nuance and integrity. She does not cater to trends but instead crafts deeply considered works that challenge the viewer intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually.
Her contributions to the art world are significant not only for their aesthetic power but for their ethical and political implications. She’s not simply creating for the gallery—she’s creating for the community, for the archive, for the ancestors.
Conclusion: A Living Archive of Emotion and Resistance
Phoebe Collings James is more than a contemporary artist—she is a modern-day griot, a keeper of stories, a sculptor of memory and revolution. Through ceramics, sound, and performance, she builds spaces where vulnerability and power meet, where identity is both affirmed and questioned, and where healing is ongoing.
Her legacy is already being shaped—not just through museum walls but in classrooms, kitchens, and conversations where people are learning to touch clay, feel sound, and confront silence. In that sense, Collings James isn’t just making art—she’s changing lives.
