Out of Form is a collection of self-portraits, feelings, and thoughts. It is a direct reflection of Jones’s reality as a multi-racial, bi-sexual, bi-polar, schizophrenic woman.

Slideshow of Artwork

Give your about the show, support an emerging artist.

Artist Statement

I’ve always used art to process my experiences and navigate my mental health. I thought my old sketchbooks would give me a definition of self, but I no longer knew the girl who made them. Out Of Form was created as an intentional act of self awareness. I focused on discovering my foundations from childhood through the use of primary colors and basic shapes and lines. I juxtaposed this exploration with figures that change in color, size and shape just as we shift to adapt to our experiences. As I continue moving through the various stages of life, I wonder how much choice we are truly afforded in who we become.

Bio

Justice Jones is an artist, educator and activist completing her final year at Augsburg University as a studio art major. Her passion for learning invites her to explore many different media. Justice practices community space-making, organizing, and activation as a Tactical Urbanism instructor’s assistant at Juxtaposition Arts. She uses foundational elements of fine art to explore and process her experiences and the idea of nature versus nurture as opposed to choice in who we become. Her work on Juxtaposition Arts’ mural team, her business, and Out Of Form, are all informed by these values and beliefs.

Virtual Mock-up

Due to COVID-19 the show in the physical gallery space has been delayed. Here is a virtual representation of what it will look like in the Gallery720 space.

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Northern Blends: The Artfulness of Coffee and Tea in the Canadian Midwest

March 1-30, 2019, Christensen Gallery

NCECA: March 27–30

Reception: Thursday, March 28, 5–9p.m.

NCECA 2019, Minneapolis, Minnesota: these neighbors to your north felt a certain kinship to this year’s setting. Minnesota is often affectionately referred to as “Canada’s 11th province” because of our shared love of hockey, reputation for unfailing politeness, and of course, bitterly cold winters. One of the great connectors in those freezing moments is a shared pot of coffee or tea. A warm cup can bring friends and strangers together, and create bonds across borders and cultures. It’s also part of many daily routines, active in both our social and individual lives. We form private and public rituals related to the preparation and serving of these beverages, whether we’re hoping for a moment of comfort, convenience, hospitality, decadence, or rest in the midst of busy modern lives. Now more than ever it seems like taking a moment for conversation over a shared cup could do our world some good.

With Northern Blends, a small group of Canadian ceramic artists would like to offer an invitation to consider the meaning present in the simple act of brewing, serving and enjoying a cup. Featured are pots that celebrate and examine our relationship to the common phrase, “Would you like a cup of coffee or tea?” Each artist offers their own particular response. As a collective, they showcase the diversity of the Canadian experience. Moving between practicality and pleasure, the single-cup and the generous pot, we offer seven approaches that highlight the unique role the hand-made pot has in bringing a sense of artfulness to our day-to-day lives.

While each artist takes their own approach to material and process, all maintain a shared dedication to craftsmanship, design and the pivotal role of the artist’s hand in creating meaningful objects. This exhibition also offers American and International NCECA audiences a window into contemporary functional ceramics from the Canadian “midwest”. The artists of “Northern Blends” are a diverse group. There are artists born and raised in Canada as well as recent immigrants, those who studied abroad and those whose education is based in Canada. The work in this exhibition gives audiences a sense of the rich range of experience and knowledge in the Canadian landscape. Northern Blends celebrates the traditions, relationships and moments generated from the simple pleasures of coffee and tea. It is an invitation for conversation across processes and styles, borders and barriers over a shared cup.

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March 1-30, 2019 – Gage Gallery

NCECA: March 26–30

Reception: March 28, 5-9p.m.

This recent series of idiosyncratic sculpture and painting by Jim Shrosbree continues the artist’s ongoing investigation and use of abstraction to permeate humanistic experience. The title infers a set of actions that are both playful and vital, consciously defining and alerting us to their call.

Artist Bio

2017-2018 Pollock-Krasner Foundation grantee, Jim Shrosbree, just completed a third artist residency at Yaddo.�� He is noted for his sculpture, painting and works on paper.�� They have been exhibited nationally and internationally and his work is included in such collections as Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Detroit Institute of Art, Daum Museum of Contemporary Art, Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum, Des Moines Art Center, Mint Museum and University of Iowa Museum of Art.�� In addition to his most recent award and residency fellowship are those from the National Endowment for the Arts, Iowa Arts Council, Idaho Arts and Humanities Commission, MacDowell Colony and Watershed Center for Ceramic Art. Shrosbree earned his MFA in Ceramics at University of Montana.�� He is Professor of Art at Maharishi University, Fairfield, Iowa.

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Temporal Patterns – JULIANE SHIBATA

January 17 – February 20, 2019 – Christensen Gallery

Reception: Thursday, January 17, 6-8 p.m.

Integrating real flowers with ceramic ones, Shibata explores the ephemeral in a large-scale installation that celebrates both ornamental and time-based patterns encountered throughout life.

Bio

Juliane received her MFA in Ceramics from Bowling Green State University, having previously graduated from Carleton with a BA in Studio Art. She has taught at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota and Hope College in Holland, Michigan. She was selected as a 2016 Emerging Artist by Ceramics Monthly and has been an artist in residence at the Appalachian Center for Craft in Tennessee and The Pottery Workshop in Jingdezhen, China. Juliane received 2018 and 2014 Artist Initiative grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board and her work belongs to the permanent collection of Northern Arizona University’s Art Museum and the Brown-Forman Collection.

This year, her work was included in exhibitions at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, the Perlman Teaching Museum at Carleton College, Raymond Avenue Gallery, Inver Hills Community College, and KOBO Gallery in Seattle. In March 2019, Juliane’s work will be featured in four exhibitions that coincide with the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts conference in Minneapolis.

Juliane Shibata is a fiscal year 2018 recipient of an Artist Initiative grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

Above Image: …vita brevis (detail) 2017, Porcelain and real carnations

Photo credit: Eric Mueller

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JANUARY 22 – February 1, 2018

Christensen Center Student Art Gallery

Artist Talk: Thursday, Feb. 1,��5:30 – 7��p.m. Christensen Center Student Art Gallery

Using stacked stone structures, Gardner’s work strives to show a connection that exists between the human world and the natural world while incorporating his submersion into adulthood.

Bio

Glen Gardner is a multi-media artist who is currently finishing up his last year in Augsburg Studio Art Program. He has taken up a focus on how humans interact with the environment, while expressing this with 3D media. His art focuses on bringing the audience to have an emotional connection to the natural and human world.

Statement

Growing up, I did a lot of hiking. A common character on these hikes were cairns, human-made structures of short, deliberately stacked rocks, and I was fascinated with them. Since then, I have come to believe that they are much more than just piles of rocks. On a functional level, these cairns of my early life served the purpose of marking a pathway where a trail didn’t exist. The instructions were simple: play a game of connect-the-dots with the stone piles. But they did something more. They showed me that I could be an architect in a human world. The simplicity of the forms, along with the abundance of material, encouraged these natural sculptures. I also began to realize that, because these stones had been exposed to the natural world, the materials gained a very intricate but consistent aesthetic. The processes of erosion effectively put thousands of years of work into these rocks, and the fact that similar rocks will be in the same place creates the ingredients for an interesting sculpture. By combining these natural processes with a human architect, and then performing this in a location that has been developed by nature for years and years and years, a cairn becomes a piece of art. Upon moving to Minneapolis, I noticed that the cairns I was seeing were taking a much different form. Before, they were used to mark a path, but in the Twin Cities this was much less needed. Instead, cairns here seem to mark a space for people, showing that a destination had been reached. They also spoke to the human compulsion to create and build. There have been several times at Hidden Beach when people just stacked rocks for whatever reason.

For my art, I wanted to recreate a feeling of entering a natural space in an unnatural setting while evoking childlike wonder among the participants. As I began this journey, I started to realize that these forms need to allow the natural world in. Unfortunately, I was lacking the time to erode materials for years and years, so I decided to leave a lot of forms up to chance. This meant that I would try to manipulate the form’s aspects as minimally as possible and allow the material to speak for itself. I began to see each stone that I made as a building block used to create a larger form. The results were these large and heavy spinal forms that could not be self-supported. The results were not jovial; they speak to me as a visual representation of me drifting away from the child inside, but still keeping those experiences in my heart.

Images from Exhibit

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Bowing

Artist Statement

My practice is a meditation on time and its role in the decay of objects and memories. Inspiration is drawn from historical objects, the architecture around me, or a personal relationship. My processes are repetitive and labor intensive; I draw, construct, and weave using materials to depict fleeting, fragile moments and to examine the temporary physicality of an object or idea. I create work to find the beauty and the unrest in this temporal state.

Artist Bio

Kate Roberts is native of Greenville, South Carolina. She received both her MFA and BFA at Alfred University in 2015 and 2010 respectively. She has completed residencies at Archie Bray Foundation for Ceramic Arts in Helena, MT, Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Colorado, La Meridiana in Italy, and Le Cite International des Arts in Paris. Her work has been exhibited at the Tampa Art Museum in Tampa, FL and Everson Museum in Syracuse, NY; major exhibitions include the 69^th Scripps Ceramic Annual, the 2011 and 2015 NCECA Biennial, and Ceramic Top 40. She is currently a Lecturer of Ceramics at University of Washingto

BOWING – Q/A with artist

Has clay/porcelain always been your preferred media?

Yes! I have been working with clay since I was in high school. I fell in love with its ability to be manipulated into anything. It’s just dirt.��It can be hard, soft, rough, wet, vitreous, and all of these qualities can come together to make a beautiful piece. I have been working with porcelain specifically since my senior year of undergrad.

��

How do you feel your style is evolving?

It is becoming looser and more abstract in its imagery. I am allowing the nature of the material to��dictate what will happen.

When do you know when you are finished with a piece?

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For the Frill of It

November 11 – December 20, 2016

Reception: November 11, 6 – 8 p.m. – ��

Cohen’s ceramic installation references clay roof tiles, using something practical as a springboard to make something impractical — ruffled tiles.�� In For the Frill of It, Cohen questions the definition of value, what is useful and important, and ideas of luxury and excess.

Artist Statement

As a ceramic artist, I am committed to exploring clay as an expressive material. Its tactile quality, rich history, and utilitarian, sculptural, and decorative applications continually inspire me.��For the Frill��of It��references clay roof tiles, a practical springboard to make something impractical — ruffled tiles.

This project began as a daydream over a year ago. I imagined myself very small and standing under a giant ballerina’s tutu. Surrounded and enveloped by her tutu, I was swept by the beauty of her skirt. It wasn’t until I revisited this daydream that I began to recognize the strength, power, and grace of the ballerina.

In the studio, ideas of luxury and excess and how they translate through fashion and dress initially inspired my research. Through a reductive process in which I removed more and more information, a ruffled tile remained. As I began constructing the ruffles and testing fit and installation methods, the similarity to clay roof tiles was evident. The connection to a roof, its purpose to provide protection, added layers to the ruffles, not only in physical assembly but in meaning. This association deepened my exploration of what is viewed as feminine and masculine and how they support and/or oppose one another.

The production of the tiles was systematic. The repetitive tasks and months of studio time allowed for an internal dialogue about investment of time and effort, practicality, and triviality. As the work increased in size and scope, it began to take on a life of its own and I no longer questioned my commitment to it or its value.

For the Frill of It��has been a transformative journey. Through the enormity of the project and commitment required, I continually examined and reflected on my evolving relationship to the work. My hope with this work is to impart warmth, softness, and strength.

This project was made possible by the support of friends and family for which I am truly grateful. I wish to thank Jenny Wheatley for her trust, support, and encouragement and Peter Hannah for his expertise, guidance, and assistance. In addition, I would like to thank Katie Smith, Linda Dobosenki, Anne Wendland, Seth Eberle, Brian Antonich, Sarah Ostrum Reis, Stacie Schlomer Totzke, Kimberlee Joy Roth, Trygve Nordberg, Alyssa Baguss, and others who graciously donated their time and effort to make this project happen.

-Eileen Cohen

Q&A with Eileen Cohen

Where did you find the inspiration for this project?

A few ideas played into the conception of this piece. I knew I wanted to use the wall and create work with a strong visual impact. I was thinking about fabric moving on or off the wall, about molding and how it is used to hide or conceal seams and dress up a space, and about ruffles and tutus. Further, the connection to ceramics as a material and its history was an important factor and consideration. The work references roof tiles and makes a connection back to clay as a humble material, one with function and purpose. I questioned the purpose of making ruffled tiles to make a pretty wall and the value of doing it,��For the Frill of It, so to speak. The journey has been invaluable and full of unexpected lessons.

What are some of the challenges you faced while creating?

I spent several months testing what size and shape to make tiles and how to install them on a wall. The scale of the project grew beyond my original conception leading to storage issues, time constraints, cost, etc. I have a small workspace and quickly max out space, impacting production.

How have the quantity of tiles and repetition that goes into creating each individual tile contributed to your experience and the meaning of this piece as a whole?

I enjoyed the repetition. The repetitive action is a practice or discipline. It helped set goals for how I used my time in the studio and kept me focused and goal-oriented. The quantity of tiles made me question the practicality of this project and ask questions about how I spend my time, effort and money.�� I struggled with acceptance of my idea and the value of doing it but at a certain point I fully committed. In the end, it was completely worthwhile and a valuable pursuit.

How have people responded to this project so far?

Overwhelmingly supportive. Curious. Interested.

What message would you like the viewer to take away from this installation?

I wanted to create a warm, soft, feminine space. I hope the viewer stands in awe of it for a moment.

What advice would you give to aspiring artists?

Trust yourself. Commit to your ideas. Ask for help. Plan ahead. Ask questions.

Questions by Gallery Assistant Katie Smith

FOR THE FRILL OF IT Images

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TErra Firma

August 29 – October 27, 2016

Reception: September 16, 6-8 p.m.

In this exhibition of new drawings and sculpture, Vossler reflects on the narrative of Dante’s Inferno, specifically exploring how the metaphor of water functions as both a connective element and a source of danger.

Bio

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WHAT WE HAVE TO LOSE

August 29 – October 27, 2016

Reception: September 16, 6-8 p.m.

Artist Statement

A marriage of embellishment and utilitarian object is the inspiration behind my oeuvre: that is to create utilitarian non-traditionally shaped ceramic serving platters that maintain a curvilinear edge throughout the form and which reference historical decorative motifs. Today’s contemporary ceramics include figurative forms and abstract sculpture, utilitarian ware and architectural and decorative tile. My work is wall sculpture that is still functional; it can be used to also contain and serve food. I see it as a bridge between decorative tile and utilitarian ware and as a vehicle for beginning a communication between these two disparate uses of the same material.

Bio

Kimberlee Joy Roth graduated from the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities with an MFA in Ceramics and an Art History minor in 2007. Her fall 2012 solo exhibition at St. Catherine University’s Catherine G. Murphy Gallery in St. Paul, MN raised $1,143 for The Algalita Marine Research Institute in Long Beach, California.

She is a 2013 McKnight Artist Fellow in Ceramics and a Fiscal Year 2016 and 2011 recipient of an Artist Initiative Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. Her ceramic work is in the permanent collection of the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis, MN, Mayo Clinic Rochester, Rochester, Minnesota, 71 France Apartments, Edina, Minnesota and the Lincoln Arts and Culture Foundation in Lincoln, California. Her work has been shown nationally in juried ceramic exhibitions.

She maintains a studio in the Northeast Arts District of Minneapolis and is the Technician for the Art and Art History Department and The Catherine G. Murphy Gallery at St. Catherine University.

Kimberlee Joy Roth is a fiscal year 2016 recipient of an Artist Initiative grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

Robert Silberman is Associate Professor of Art History at the University of Minnesota, where he teaches courses on the history of cinema and other subjects. He received his Ph.D. in English Literature from Columbia University. He was senior advisor for the 1999 PBS series American Photography: A Century of Images and, with Vicki Goldberg, co-author of the companion volume. A regular contributor to the Burlington Magazine, he has curated exhibitions on art, photography, and ceramics, including six exhibitions at Northern Clay Center in Minneapolis, most recently Out of the Labyrinth: Contemporary Mexican Ceramics. The many ceramic artists he has written about include Warren MacKenzie, Gail Kendall, Ken Price, Amy Sabrina, and Randy Johnston.

WHAT WE HAVE TO LOSE – q/a with artist

Could you briefly explain your process for us?

The end goal is to have work with curvilinear edges and interiors having singular, or multiple, distinct concave sections. The outside edge of the work is drawn onto paper and then transferred to either Styrofoam or clay. The interior and sides are then carved. If the piece is clay, it is fired to cone 022. I then make a plaster multipart mold and use that to make the final slip cast porcelain forms.

How do the ideas and creation process start and how do you know when you’re done?

I look at a lot of artwork, keep up with current events and try to learn from what I think are successful art forms as to how their political and environmental issues are represented, distilled and communicated successfully. As an artist I’m never done; each previous installation supports the next and sparks more ideas.

What originally inspired you to bridge the gap between utilitarian ware and wall sculpture?

It evolved over a number of years. I initially wanted to move away from round forms made on the potter’s wheel and started slip casting. Slip casting naturally led to making a large number of the same form, and then it again came naturally to place the work into repetitive patterns. The negative spaces created between the pieces are quite lovely, so I experimented and played with making forms whose negative and positive spaces looked balanced and made an interesting composition.

��Who are some of your major artistic influences?

Eva Zeisel and Richard Notkin

I noticed that you include some glaze recipes on your website. What tips might you have for people looking to experiment with creating their own original glaze recipes but aren’t quite sure where to start?

Go to the library and look at glaze books or look on-line for a glaze you like, and then make a 500 gram batch. Glaze a small cup and bowl with it. Test it in both oxidation and reduction. Then, take out the oxide colorant and see what the base glaze is like. If the base glaze seems promising, that is you like the way it feels or looks, then test the base with a variety of different oxides and percentages of oxides. An example would be to make a 200 gram batch and add 1% of an oxide, dip in a test tile, label it, then add another 1% for a 2% test, then another 2% for a 4% test, and then another 4% for an 8% test and see what the glaze looks like on these 4 test tiles. I’ve made hundreds of glaze tests, but the best glazes I have are from trying new oxide blends in tried and true base glazes.

��What is your favorite part of the ceramic process?

Designing the forms and laying out the finished work into a pattern.

Could you tell us a bit about your educational experiences? What led you to originally pursue a science degree and then later pursue an art degree?

Everyone has choices to make throughout their life; each choice leads to a different path. I made a choice during high school to pursue a Math and Physics degree because it came easy to me and it was safe. I knew I would be able to get a teaching job after college and be secure and self-reliant as a single woman in the 1990s. But teaching high school became redundant and I needed to challenge myself. At first I was planning to get my PhD in Physics, but a few key choices and a hard look at what made me content and happy led me back to school for art. I always had the peace of mind that if things did not work out I had my Physics and Math degree to fall back on. I know I made the right choice because of how happy and challenged I am when I am in my studio.

How does your math and science background come into play with your artwork?

My science and math training taught me perseverance to solve problems. I am used to getting things wrong the first few times and working through ideas to find a reasonable solution. I think to myself – we humans have created a variety of complex and amazing inventions, I can figure out how to solve this or that problem within my ceramics – it’s not as if I’m making a rocket to go to the moon or an integrated circuit from square one. Along with this tenacious attitude, my science background has taught me confidence and experimental skills, both of which I use while pushing the boundaries of the ceramics medium to its physical limitations and in glaze calculation. I consider my ceramics studio a chemistry and engineering lab.

What else can you tell us about your exhibition��What We Have To Lose��that we might not get from your artist statement or simply by viewing the work?

It’s harder to make small turtles and snails then it is to make the larger tiles and top pieces.

What tips do you have for artists trying to minimize their environmental impact while still being able to effectively create work and get a message across?

Try not to use plastic, synthetic fabric or other materials refined from crude oil. Then use whatever is the best material to get your ideas across.

��What is next for you?

I am developing new forms and glaze colors, and working simultaneously with another slip body. I also have ideas for other tile forms with incised imagery. I work best if I follow ideas down varying and multiple paths, keep experimenting and allow every kiln to be a sort of test.

Questions by Gallery Assistant Katie Smith

WHAT WE HAVE TO LOSE –��images

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Deciphering Nebulas

January 12 – March 26, 2015

Jeanine Hill presents various works including drawings, ceramics, and an installation. These works are inspired by the transformations of line into form, land into sky, and stars and planets into universes. This collection depicts a state of constant becoming.

Artist Statement

The works that I am currently making are three-dimensional maps of the literal and metaphoric terrains that I have traveled.�� Within my work, form stands with purpose and content lies within the context of my life experiences.�� It is through the examination of personal history and the construction and reconstruction of this history’s landscape that I am able to��decipher��my own mysteries through the morphology of clay.

Artist Bio

Jeanine Hill was born in Alcalde, New Mexico on a Pueblo reservation where she and her family were surrounded by vast orchards and high canyon walls. Her first exposure to the arts was early on when her father began taking photographs of the traditional Pueblo ceremonies by day and working with wood by night. She was taught the value of storytelling by her mother, who used words to shape the world. Jeanine’s��own making and storytelling practices were forged out of hours of being lost in the woods of Vermont, and sharing stories with her siblings.

Q&A with Jeanine Hill

What is the main focus of inspiration��for the pieces included in this exhibition?

I have spent the last two years working on the pieces for this show. In this time I have traveled quite a bit, and the extensive traveling has been an inspiration. But I would have to say that the greatest influence or inspiration for the work is the experience of landscape, the role it plays in our lives, and the way in which place enables us to not only understand who and where we are but also to navigate our world in a more grounded way.

How would you describe your creative process?

�� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� ��

I usually work in shifts. Because my studio practice involves a wide variety of materials, I rarely work with multiple materials at the same time. Working this way allows me to deeply focus on the material at hand and the processes required. A year of my artistic life will often involve six to eight months of working in clay, three months of drawing, and perhaps a month or two working with textiles. That being said, there could be a year that doesn’t look like this at all and I spend the whole year throwing pots or drawing. It all depends on where I am emotionally and physically at the time.

Where did your initial attraction to examining your path in life as a visual record stem from?

I come from a long line of storytellers and within this history there are diverse ethnic backgrounds that come into play. Storytelling and the making of artwork have played a tremendous role in my family’s history. I think that coming from such a diverse background as I do, as well as all of the moving and traveling I have done in my life, have required me to be constantly reflective. The consistent examination of who I am as a human being allows who I am to remain in a state of constant flux, which I suppose in some ways allows the change to not be so difficult.

What��message do��you want to get across to viewers through your art?

I don’t know that there is a specific message I am hoping to get across. I simply hope that in the telling of my story, it enables the viewers to see their own story within the work as well, that perhaps my work is simply a window or door into their own lives.

What are some of your artistic influences?

I am drawn to well-crafted, process oriented work that shows the presence of the hand in the work. So within this realm I would say that one of my biggest influences is Lee Bontecou. As an artist she possesses a strong integrity to craft and content, and it shows in the work. I am also deeply influenced by the work of Georgia O’Keefe. I find it refreshing to look at works of art that speak of beauty. Lastly, I would have to say I am heavily inspired by Karen Karnes. Her later, more sculptural works possess a strong sense of the unknown, while still trying to name the mystery of existence through the use of the hands.

You describe your work as “relics of visually constructed memory.” What influence does this kind of recordkeeping have in your day-to-day life?

I believe strongly in the recording of life so I carry a pen and journal wherever I go. There is something deeply personal about writing down notes that document your life, not so much so that you can go back and read it but to simply become acquainted with pausing throughout your day to witness and reflect. By witnessing and reflecting on my life through the written work and other materials such as clay, I am able to put it outside of myself and move on.

Would you say you are striving to create a visual diary?

No, not a diary, a visual landscape yes. A few years back I read this amazing book called the “Anatomy of the Spirit.” In the book the author talks a lot about how our bodies become a biological landscape of both our physical and emotional lives and that everything we go through both physically and emotionally affects our physiology. In essence we become a walking landscape. When I think of the work I am making, I suppose I think of it in a similar way. It is a visual landscape of my work, and one piece could be based on one particular moment or nine years of my life.

What are some of the reactions you have received from people viewing your work?

I have heard from quite a few people that they see my work as being fairly poetic and quiet.��

What is one thing you have learned about yourself as an artist in creating these works?

I have learned that it is helpful if I have time and space to slowly create the work, one piece after another. If I am able to sit with all of the work for a prolonged period, slowly, I am able to see how the pieces should fit together, who are the characters, and what the story is that needs to be told.

What kind of experiences do you draw��from for inspiration?

I draw from all of my experiences, both the good and the bad. All of it is meaty and offers substance that can be used as inspiration.

How long did it take you to develop your own style?

I am still creating it.

Most of your ceramic pieces are rounded, organic, and flowing shapes. Is there a specific meaning behind this?

I suppose when I think of the human body and the movement of landscapes, I think of soft, organic shapes.

Does your work on one project often lead to the inspiration of your next endeavor?

I do my best to not take too much down time in between projects, so the short answer is yes. But I would also like to believe that because it is my hand that is making the work, there will always be a consistent line of thought between the vast expanses.

What’s next?

Keep making, making, making. It is all in the work.

Questions by gallery intern Johanna Goggins.

DECIPHERING NEBULAS Images

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