Gwyn Hanssen Pigott (1935-2013) was born in Ballarat, Victoria. She became interested in pottery while studying Fine Arts at the University of Melbourne. From 1955-58, as Gwyn Johns, she was apprenticed to Ivan McMeekin at Mittagong. She then spent the next 15 years in England, then in France, before returning to Australia in 1973 and working in Tasmania, South Australia, then Queensland, where she is currently based. Her entry in the Dictionary of Australian Artists Online further details her life, influences and work, which is marked with an impressed 'O'. She is internationally well-known as a ceramic artist, and her still-life groupings of bottles and bowls are also valued in the wider art world. She was awarded an Order of Australia in 2002 for her contribution to the field of ceramics. In 2005, the National Gallery of Victoria held a retrospective exhibition Gwyn Hanssen Pigott: A Survey 1955-2005.