Turn on the water works: why emotion fuels creative brilliance

First, is his own close relationship with the medium at hand. He describes clay not as a material, but “a lifelong companion”. As an art form though, pottery is disciplined. It is a craft, but also a skill that is learned and refined over time. “For any kind of artistic endeavour, there is an incredible amount of discipline needed,” Keith argues. Yet, it’s seeing how expression shows up in the midst of discipline that stirs his emotions: “Wasn’t it Picasso who said I’ve spent a lifetime painting, to paint like a child?”

It’s also an individual’s creative capacity that Keith links his all-encompassing reactions back to. “I could give you all the same design brief and you’d all come up with something different, because of your history and the experiences throughout your life,” he describes. As a judge he’s surveying for technical ability, but it’s the ‘story’ Keith clearly holds most dear. “If I can see someone’s hard work, thought process, and that they’ve truly tried to emulate the emotional response they were going through at the time, I find that quite amazing,” he adds. “That’s what I tap into.”

Now in its eighth series, The Great Pottery Throw Down is full of vases, pitchers and tea sets that all tell the tales of their potters. Christine Cherry, from season two, is one Keith immediately mentions. Towards the end of the series, four remaining contestants were asked to create an image of themselves in surrealist sculpture: “They all came up with something completely different but Christine created, ironically, the simplest of forms,” – a sculpture encapsulating a long battle with breast cancer: “It basically said everything about her,” he tells It’s Nice That. In response, tears flowed from Keith (of course) while camera and production teams were caught weeping out of shot. “It was everything that the show should be, and is, about… Telly is a terrible one for labelling people with a badge of honour because of struggle, but we’ve all had struggles. It’s what you do with that struggle that I’m interested in.”

There is also a kind of simple romanticism in the objects Throw Down contestants make, which strikes an emotional chord – with Keith, and the show’s viewers. “We all have a favourite mug, or plate that we eat off,” he reasons. “Without being a hippy nightmare about it, you do create relationships with these inanimate objects because of what they become to you. Especially a mug!” It’s the everydayness of the pots made on the show – the craft behind the objects we spend our lives with – which holds that emotional resonance. Familiarity is key to the show’s charm.

The film director Anna Mantzaris is also no stranger to working with human emotions. As a stop-motion animator working by hand, creating emotionally charged pieces is “one of the core reasons why I like to make films,” she says. “Maybe it’s a bit narcissistic, but the experience of making the whole audience feel something specific is such a great feeling. I think it can be a bit of a purpose in itself, to create feelings in the audience.”

That’s not to say Anna’s work is in any way soppy. In fact, her breakout short Enough – a film featuring various characters ‘giving up’ (storming out of meetings, falling to the ground after missing the bus) – introduced Anna as a director adept at comedic bleakness, paired with soft character design. And, through her portrayal of everyday struggles, demonstrated how true emotional resonance stems from authenticity, not embellishment. “I’m often drawn by a desire to make the audience laugh and feel warm, while at the same time a bit of a pain and sadness, and hopefully make them reflect,” the director says. “When you see something that you recognise yourself in, and it’s a bit painful because it’s true, but it’s also really funny. To laugh at our imperfections, in a way.”

Having established herself as a director who can balance these nuanced emotions, Anna is often called upon by commercial clients for this specific style – a tone and a narrative that remains in the eye of the viewer. This level of heart-plucking emotional storytelling is “like a gateway into the audience,” she says. For Anna, reluctant protagonists – your Mark Darcys, Severus Snapes or Grus – are a visual vehicle to elicit such responses. “I do love imperfect everyday-like characters that we recognise ourselves in – and sometimes our less desirable traits in as well,” she says. “Little anti-heroes that melt our hearts.”

Narratively, Anna is able to evoke these feelings in charged yet simple short films. Rather than an all-bells-and-whistles exploration of emotion, her work resonates in its straightforwardness. The quietly emotional work of photographer Ruizhe Hong echoes this, both in his work and tact behind-the-scenes. “I’d say the way I take photographs is quite intuitive and simple,” Ruizhe says. “For me personally, the ability to create emotionally charged work is to start from oneself, to question what sort of topic you are truly drawn to.”