Profile

Parisian Karen Swami discovered pottery at the age of five and took ceramics classes throughout her childhood. After studying at business school, she worked in real estate, then opened an antiques shop at the Paul Bert market before launching into film production.

In 2010 she did a ceramics internship led by Thierry Fouquet who encouraged her to take her CAP. Which she did as an independent candidate the same year. She then installed a kiln and a wheel in her production office and made ceramics alongside her work in the film industry. The great Parisian decorator Christian Liaigre discovered her work and began a collaboration with her that continues to this day with Maison Liaigre.

In 2014 Karen Swami set up her studio and opened a gallery in Paris, and devoted herself exclusively to her passion for ceramics. Her creations quickly seduced the big names in design and fashion: the prestigious Maison Alberto Pinto, Bruno Moinard, the luxury scenographer, former partner of Andrée Putman, Christian Dior Maison, Guerlain, Cartier, l’Oréal… Karen Swami also had a series of exhibitions in Paris (Lionelle Courbet gallery, Minsky gallery, NAG gallery, Atrata Paris…), Brussels, London, Lisbon and in the United States: in 2017 and 2023 at March Fine Art, in San Francisco, in 2019 at Design Miami-Art Basel in Miami, in 2022 and 2024 at the Ateliers Coubert in New York.

Karen Swami likes to play with materials, flames, oxides and pushes know-how to the limit by confronting earthenware and stoneware.
It is by simplifying volumes that she magnifies color and texture games. If the shape of Etruscan vases inspires her, a simple pot is transformed into a unique art object under her fingers. Her approach exudes shadow play, mystery, clean lines and modernity.

From shagreen trompe-l'oeil to the art of kintsugi, including smoky earths, this enthusiast since the age of 5 touches, turns, smooths, incises and encrusts the material in her Parisian workshop.
An artisan, Karen Swami is one with the earth that she has tamed over time and through its manufacturing stages.