My pottery is an offering to the fire and a vessel to enhance daily rituals.

I wheel-throw utilitarian forms including mugs, bowls, teaware, planters, plates and vases. Using atmospheric firing methods, crackle glazes, and slips, I create a tactile surface decoration that is elegant and whimsical.

Artist Statement

Continuing the craft of ceramics is radical and revolutionary in a world where we are increasingly surrounded by machine-made goods. I see myself as part of keeping the tradition of craft alive in this modern world. Continuing to create and teaching how to create with our hands is important for our mental health, our sense of well-being, and the continued creation of culture in a mass-produced world. I am committed to my business having a positive impact in the world, acting in solidarity with movements for social and climate justice, and doing a small part to pave the path toward liberation for all beings, and a more balanced and peaceful world.

I like to explore texture and form in my pottery, both in the construction of the pot and in the surface decoration. I strive to create imaginative but functional pieces that are firmly rooted in organic forms and surfaces. I deeply enjoy the process of throwing on the wheel, the sensation in my body and the places it takes me in my mind, tethering me to the moment. I am fascinated with the process of atmospheric firing, from the physical effort and community involvement it demands to the energizing sensation of heat as we stoke the kiln and the spontaneity of results. My pottery is an offering to the fire and a vessel to enhance daily rituals. These pieces invite the opportunity to enjoy everyday experiences more deeply - such as drinking a cup of coffee, or eating a meal with family, inviting stillness, connection, awareness and enjoyment.

Green Clay: Working with Earth and Water

Using a variety of clays, I wedge and then throw on the wheel to create the forms, often in batches of 10-30. After trimming the base of the form, I apply decoration and slowly and evenly dry the pieces.

I use a few different types of clay to get different colors, surface textures, and effects in the final piece. I mostly use high fire stoneware clay, and enjoy the clean and bright surface of white stoneware, as well as the speckling and the rich texture of high iron stoneware. I also love the strong white, silvers, and blush in wood fired porcelain, and its creamy texture when I throw it on the wheel.

I use my hands to wedge the clay, working out any unevenness in moisture and then cut it into the desired weight I will be throwing that day. As a production potter, I most

often work in series, making anywhere from a dozen to 40 of the form. I throw on the wheel, finding a rhythm in the repetition of hand and body movements to create the forms I envision. Once the pieces have dried to the leather-hard stage, where the clay holds its form and can be manipulated, I trim them and attach handles as necessary. Next comes the slip trailed decoration, which I either apply to the raw clay or brush on a slip first, and decorate on top of this coat. Then I leave pieces to slowly finish their drying process, ensuring evenness of temperature and moisture to avoid cracking and distortion.

The First Stage of Fire: Bisque

Once the vessels are completely dry, I load them into an electric kiln for the first “bisque” firing, making the clay form strong and porous.

Once pieces have completely dried to the “bone dry” stage, they are ready to be bisqued. I load the pieces into an electric kiln - plates rim to rim, bowls stacked inside of each other, mugs stacked sometimes 50 on one shelf. The pottery can all be in contact with each other in this firing because the clay is raw. The purpose of the bisque firing is to move the clay through a process of being heated to roughly 1830F (or 1000C), also known as Cone 06. This permanently alters the clay composition, burning out all organic matter and giving it a strong porous structure that can allow it to absorb glaze.

Glazing: Chemicals in Suspension

Each piece of pottery is glazed through various methods of dipping and pouring. The glaze is a unique recipe and made from scratch using raw materials.

Once unloaded from the bisque firing, the pieces are ready for glazing. I mix all of my glazes up from the raw ingredients - much like baking a cake, alumina, silica, metal oxides, and other mined materials are weighed out in powder and then combined with water. Each piece of pottery has to be cleaned and then waxed, which behaves as a resist and prevents glaze from adhering to a surface that might come into contact with the kiln shelf. I usually will line up like forms and glaze them in series, depending on the form and the surface I desire for it. With mugs, for example, I will line them up in a row of 12 at a time, and pour glaze into the first cup, then pour that cup out into the next cup and so on until each interior is lined with glaze. Then I dip the outer part of the mug in glaze.

My crackle work is particularly demanding in this stage, as each piece needs to be lined in a satin white, then the exterior needs to be brushed with a slip, and then the outside of the mug is dipped in the crackle glaze. I get the variation in the surface by blowing on the crackle glaze while it is still wet, revealing the dark blue slip behind it in a random, wind-like way. This is all very messy, and I splatter glaze all over, so I am careful with cleanup and what I wear.

When all of the pieces are glazed, it’s time for the final firing! This is where my work branches out, depending on the type of firing the pottery will undergo!

Woodfiring: Painted by the Flames

My woodfired work is loaded into a kiln and fired by a team of potters for anywhere from 3-5 days. The results are spontaneous and different every time, affected by many variables including placement in the kiln, type of wood used, length of firing, and the progression of the firing cycle.

For pieces that will be fired in the wood kiln, the process begins early. As a member of the firing team at Pleasant Hill Pottery, I sign up for firings based on the amount of space my work will take up in the kiln. I fire in the anagama kiln, train kiln, and salt kiln at PHP, and it is always with a team of potters, depending on the size of the kiln. While the train kiln usually takes 4-5, the anagama requires many more, sometimes upward of 30 people’s work!

All the pieces going into the kiln have to be wadded with a refractory material that literally lifts the pottery off of the shelf, usually onto 3 lugs, otherwise wood ash, salt, soda, or other materials may fuse the ceramic to the surface it is fired on. Wood glue and 3 chunks of a paste of clay, alumina, and sawdust are applied to the bottom of each piece. When you look at my wood fired work, you can generally see the 3 dots that came from where the wadding was!

After a day of loading (sometimes 2), we are ready to fire. The door is bricked up, a small campfire is lit at the entrance of the kiln, and this fire is slowly built up and then moved gently into the fire chamber. We build a bed of coals, red and hot, that accumulates as we continue stoking wood. So many variables come into play - the ports and the damper on the chimney can be adjusted, the type of wood influences the fire and the coal bed and the ash. All of the people on the firing team rotate shifts, vigilantly stoking and tracking the progress of the firing for 6 hours at a time, usually in partners. Our shared love of the flames, of clay and the journey it undergoes really highlights the transformative process. The kiln is read using pyrometric cones, which each melt at a certain ambient temperature, and sometimes we are able to bend cone 15 (roughly 2615F!). The final attained temperature will vary throughout the kiln, which is strategic in loading as well - big work that can handle extreme temperature and lots of ash accumulation are loaded near the fire ports/ chamber, and more delicate or intricate pieces such as teapots are loaded in more protected areas of the kiln. The kiln usually has to cool for at least a week or two before it is safe to unload, and this takes an entire day, all of the potters, and lots of cleanup work afterward. Shelves must be ground, washed and cleaned, the kiln has to be chipped out and vacuumed. And of course, the work has to be cleaned up! Sometimes this is simply a quick sanding, other times you needs chisels and bench grinders and Dremels and diamonds.

Cone 10 Reduction: Stoneware Production

My crackle collection and much of my commission dinnerware is fired in a downdraft gas kiln, yielding reliable results in a ^10 reduction firing.

The work in the crackle collection and the work in the colorful blue sliptrail collection is fired in a downdraft gas kiln. Club Mud, a ceramic collective that has been in Eugene since 19**, is a lively place that boasts roughly 25 working artists (some professional, some hobby). I fire the gas kiln in the courtyard on my own, which is roughly ** cubic feet. It holds anywhere from 100-200 pieces, and I fire it in about 18 hours, carefully bringing the kiln up to cone 10/cone 11 soft, keeping watch to ensure adequate reduction at critical moments. All of the shelves are stacked onto 3 bricks, so I load the bottom of the kiln first and move up, building shelves as I go and loading work onto each shelf. The bricks are stacked to create the door, and I keep watch over the quantity of gas moving into the kiln, the damper, reading the flames and the cones to reach Cone 10. The kiln cools for 2-3 days and then I unload, giving each piece a final sanding before packing it up.

Finding Homes for My Creations

Whether at a gallery, a studio sale, or online each piece that I make goes out into the world to find a new home.

Once the piece is finished, my business is to go about finding homes for each of them. Currently I sell online, in galleries, and in my studio/sidewalk sales and by commission. I have sold at many art shows throughout the Pacific Northwest and New York, Saturday Market, Holiday Market, and in stores. Often, I take orders for commissions that I will make custom for the client.