Irish artist John ffrench is best known for the brightly coloured pottery he has been handcrafting for over 50 years, for which The Irish Crafts Council honoured him last year with a lifetime retrospective exhibition.
Ffrench divides his time between his cottage near Kinvara, Co. Galway and his family home and studio in Massachusetts. As well as ceramics, he and his family design and create stunning silk-screen calendars, and have been doing so for longer than any of them care to remember.
John and his wife Primm created their first calendar decades ago for a dozen of their closest friends, and they have continued designing and screen-printing new calendars every year since. Each month is represented by a 12 x 24 silk-screened page featuring a different design. Originally John and Primm separately designed six pages each for the calendar. Once their children were old enough, though, they too began designing a page each. In recent years even John and Primms grandchildren have contributed, too.
The ffrench family calendars print runs have increased considerably over the years but the calendars remain silkscreen printed and limited edition. The 2009 calendar is now available to buy through www.thedolphinstudio.com .