Studio 4 Potters & Gallery

Rarely did I consider using clay as an art medium throughout my earlier years, but I was always interested in making art with other mediums. My parents exposed me to potters, so I asked for a battery-powered wheel, which didn’t do the job of exciting me to pursue pottery. I was more fascinated with birds, plants, and children’s book illustrations. and have collected numerous books on those subjects throughout my life.    

I thought book or botanical illustration was my future. In college I found my way to the art & art history departments to pursue some form of illustration.   

Working on my BFA in printmaking and painting (mostly egg tempera painting) was perfect for me during those years. I was able to draw for hours and loved creating a three-dimensional object on a two-dimensional surface. I continued to draw and paint, mainly plants, after my BFA and renewed an interest in photography. (Click drawings or photography to see my older work.)  During that time in college, modern sculptural ceramics was the emphasis, and I had little interest in it.

While in graduate school (MA in History – in short, paintings and political drawings from approximately 1400-1650 A.D.), I obtained a job under an archaeologist producing technical drawings of ancient pottery from an excavation in the Middle East (approximately 3300–500 BCE). To produce these drawings, I had to measure the inside, outside, and thickness of each piece with calipers, fingers, and eyes. Broken pieces were easy, but whole pieces had to be felt with my fingers alone. Little did I know that it was a great exercise for learning to feel my own pottery as I threw it on the wheel later on.

I decided to focus on pottery at this point in my life because I wanted to make art that can be touched and used. Ceramics is a now a permanent canvas for drawing and sculpting.   

Our studio is equipped with two electric kilns. All my pottery is wheel-thrown with some lid features and/or decoration formed by hand. Most of it is microwave and dishwasher-safe. Any pieces with gold or mother-of-pearl need to be hand-washed.