|
|
My mom took up painting
after her 80th birthday. She is proof you can be creative at any age.
My sister loves tiny
pinch pots.
|
Rain
Dragon Studio |
 |
About the Artist
The day I hung up
my shingle: March 3, 2022.
I'm an outdoor girl, so nature inspires me. The pandemic curtailed trail-hiking or travel to the coast, so I walk through my north Portland neighborhood and fill my eyes with the green glory of the Pacific Northwest. Much of my ceramic work revolves around the leaves I find on my walks. I love texture and explore the texture of leaves and all variety of impressions on clay. My whimsical Mud People sculptures were inspired by a small statue I found "purposefully abandoned" below a larch tree in Hoyt Arboretum. I was enchanted and created my own little people with textured "tattoos" all over them, which I create using leather embossing tools. These Mud People are designed to guard your houseplant or your tree or garden, and are made of earthenware.
I also love color, so most of my dishes have a bright and cheerful tone. All of my work is hand-built from slabs, coils or pinched. I'm inspired by Art Nouveau (1887-1918) and its near worship of nature-in-art. My favorite museum is the Kirkland Museum of Fine and Decorative Art in Denver, Colorado, and if you love Art Nouveau or Art Deco it is well worth a visit.
My stoneware bowls and dishes are quite varied in character. Nearly every bowl is a prototype or "maquette," as I determine which creative options will work well in larger pieces that I can show at future events and art festivals. Many of my bowls have an irregular rim on them, as I prefer the organic nature of allowing the clay to dry as round or as wonky as it prefers. (I shape the bowl rims perfectly round during construction, but then I don't force the bowl to remain that way.)
All my pottery is
created in my backyard studio. I work in both red and white stoneware.
I source my clay and glazes locally at Georgies
Ceramic & Clay, and use a mini
slab-roller to roll out evenly thick clay slabs to start with. I spend
a lot of time on the details, because art should look beautiful from any
angle, whether viewed from afar or close up.
In other creative endeavors, I also paint abstracts with alcohol inks, and I "paint" moons with sand and acrylic paint. But mostly I make functional and sculptural ceramic art with stoneware clay.
In my former life I was a craft beer brewmaster, and before that a computer programmer.
Click here to receive notices about my Art Shows & Sales.
One of my favorite
pieces: my blue-black abstract platterbowl.
