M. C. Richards and me...

"Centering, In the Art of Pottery Poetry and Person."


"The Crossing Point, Selected Talks and Writings"

Mary Caroline Richards
(1916 - 1999)

 

A poet, potter, teacher, and mystical philosopher who said that all of her art was "a celebration of the numinous," M.C. Richards often remarked, "We live in the universe, not just on Maple Avenue." Supremely self-confident, renowned for her warrior personality, she attributed much of her lifelong fearlessness to her mother's wisdom. When she was an impressionable eight-year-old, for example, a distraught neighbor came running to M.C.'s mother to tell her that M.C. had climbed up on the roof and was perched precariously at the edge. Her mother went out and called up to her daughter, "Oh, M.C., you look so beautiful up there all silhouetted against the sky."

Mary Caroline Richards was born in Weiser, Idaho, in 1916 and reared in Portland, OR.  She received a doctorate in English from the University of California at Berkeley in the 1940s, when few women received more than a high-school education, and later taught at the innovative Black Mountain College and other universities. She left two marriages and a number of unsatisfactory love relationships and started a new career at the age of seventy by joining the faculty of Matthew Fox's Institute for Culture and Creation Spirituality. As a seventieth birthday gift to herself, she had her ears pierced.   -- Mary Ford-Grabowsky

M.C. Richards also is the subject of a biographical movie "The Fire Within" taken at her home in PA where whe gave workshops, painted, and lived in an intentional community Camphill Village, an agricultural community in Kimberton, Pa., where she had lived since 1984. (The Black Mountain Library owns a copy of this film available to be checked out.)

The Fire Within is a portrait of a remarkable woman whose greatest artistic ability was perhaps to find the artist in others (despite her own impressive output as a writer, painter and potter). Most of the film centers on Richards' last years, including footage of her as she taught, wrote and worked with many special-needs adults at a Camphill Village in Pennsylvania; Richards touched the creative spark in them while working on her own art at the same time. The film offers us a striking picture of a woman who was as down-to-earth and forthright as they come, but who was likewise a dreamy visionary. She was a contradiction, and a fascinating one.  (movie review by Ken Hanke | 04/28/2004, Mountain Xpress)

Cover art for film

My life was definitely impacted by M.C. Richards.  In the 1970's I read "Centering."  The book, which became an underground classic, pulled together ideas about perception, craft, education, creativity, religion and spirituality, arguing for the richness of daily experience if carefully attended to, and the creativity of the average person. ''Poets are not the only poets,'' Ms. Richards wrote.

At that time I was not yet a potter.  I was a "hippie".  I was willing to step into the unknown, several times actually.  My boyfriend, Charlie, and I opened a co-op store in Tallahassee, naming it "Pottery, Poetry and Person." after M.C.'s book title.  Another friend, Martha, was the co-op sponsor of the book portion of the store, a loft full of great new age reading including overstuffed chairs in which to sit and read.  No big box book stores had thought of doing that in 1976 yet.  My share of the co-op was some pen & ink cards and calendars, and doing most of the hands on managing/sitting there.  Other arts and crafts were also represented, leather making, silk flower arranging, batik painting on cloth, wood inlay, watercolors. 

Charlie taught at the local alternative high school.  He learned how to make pottery, bought a wheel and some kilns, and we started making pottery there in the back of the store.  I watched what he did, and tried the same.   I even started doing demonstrations at the local fairs, as well as carrying pottery to sell there.  It was a great thing to do in the 70's in Florida.   I still have a couple of bowls that Charlie and I made...he threw them, I glazed them. One plate I made from beginning to end is carved in a Native American design, and is still in my collection also.  (It is not at all in a style MC would have promoted, being very tight compared to her organic flowing style).

Fast forward to when I finally decided to become a "real artist" and go to the University of Florida in the 80's, studying under Nan Smith to learn everything I didn't know about ceramics.  There was a lot.  But I also wrote to M. C. Richards (via her publisher probably) and told her how she had influenced my life.  She actually wrote me back.  I didn't understand that a famous woman, who had published two books, could write a student on notebook paper, but I was so excited, I carried her letter folded in my pocket of my coat.  I rode (as most students do) a bike around campus.  Someplace or another, the letter fell out.  But M.C. never fell out of the special place she holds in my heart.

M. C. Richards also planted the seed that led me to Black Mountain, NC. 

As you may already know, after I got that BFA in ceramics, I stayed in school to get an M.Ed. and Ed.S. in counseling...and found that some of the ideas being promoted for counselors still echoed those that were spoken of in "Centering."  M.C. had taught at Black Mountain College, which closed its doors back in the 50's, but not before impacting the arts and education. 

Black Mountain College was the college where performing and visual artists and John Cage engaged in a "Happening" in 1950, well before it happened again  in 1968 when I was briefly an art student in The Hartford Art School in Connecticut.  (I also was the receptionist there, thinking myself less talented and more inclined to be earning an income). 

Black Mountain College was a short-lived laboratory for innovative teaching and art whose faculty and students included Josef and Anni Albers, John Cage, Merce Cunningham, David Tudor, Robert Rauschenberg and Charles Olson. They had workshops where everyone shared making pinch pots, exploring words in creativity and "brain storming."  Buckminster Fuller, (grand-nephew of Margaret Fuller, another genius) tried out his first geodesic dome there, and returned to make a more successful one than the original one of venetian blind slats.

M. C. Richards had translated a play from the French which was produced at Black Mountain College, including Bucky Fuller as one of the characters.

M. C.'s pottery and painting (like her prose and poetry) is loose, organic, speaks of the creativity rather than the polish, and is definitely inspired.  She taught me the value of process rather than product...in everything.  That was fundamental in counseling as well.  I may have tried writing poetry also, but am willing to appreciate that written by others.

My youngest son went to a Waldorf school for a year also, which was based on the teachings of Rudolf Steiner.  I just realized that MC wrote the book that I read about him also!
Toward Wholeness: Rudolf Steiner Education in America.

And another influence of MC...when I interviewed at one of the rehabilitation centers where I counselled, I impressed the director by describing the organic crossing point in all plants (see below) as MC had taught.  Whether a person or plant, we all have almost microscopic points where change happens...in a plant from root to stem as the cells have different purposes...in a person when change becomes healthy rather than unhealthy for the organism.

It's all about Centering.

---

Seeing with Your Inner Eye

Picture in your inner eye, your inner sight, four avocado seeds on the window sill. Three are suspended in a glass of water and have sprouted. One is still dry and papery and brown. Each of the sprouting seeds has its own character. One has two long roots, like two rubbery legs folding around each other in the bottom of the glass. Out of the top rises a cluster of tiny seedling leaves, and surprisingly, on this one, these leaves are white -- little tight white albino avocado seedling leaves, coming out of that big hard seed knob. Another has one short straight root and one straight shoot bearing green leaves at the top. The third has neither root nor shoot, but the whole seed has been split open by a thrust from inside, and the two halves shoved apart by the germinating seed force -- that little bunch of stuff, big as the end of your pinkie, shoving those big doors aside like a tiny Samson. It is a wonderful sight. And now let us look at the fourth seed, dry and papery and brown, nothing showing on the outside. But within are a life force and a living plantness which we cannot see with our ordinary eyes. If we are to behold the wrinkled old seed in truth, we have to behold it with imagination, with our inner eye. Only with the inner eye of imagination can we see inner forms of Being and Becoming. In this lifeless-looking seed there is a germinating center, totally alive and totally invisible.

-- from The Crossing Point
Selected Talks and Writings

Cynthia Bringle

CYNTHIA BRINGLE  (b. 1939, Memphis, Tennessee)

Happy belated birthday, Cynthia!

A bowl a birthday!

Cynthia Bringle is known for both her functional pottery and for her enthusiastic teaching and mentoring. She has had a long career at Penland, North Carolina, creating work that reflects the culture and history of the southern highlands. Cynthia began as a painter, and continues to paint as well as decorate her work in a painterly fashion, creating what she terms as ceramic “Wall Paintings”

Cynthia began her career at the Memphis Academy of Art where she first took a short course in clay. She then took courses at Haystack School in Maine. and at Alfred University. At Alfred, she studied with both Robert Turner and Ted Randall. It was then that she returned to North Carolina and began teaching at Penland School, where she helped develop the ceramics program. She now lives permanently in Penland.

At Penland she built a gas car kiln, a wood-fired kiln, and a raku kiln. She enjoys working with the Anagama kilns, creating work that utilizes the resulting ash deposits of the firing process. Cynthia Bringle exemplifies the best of 
 American functional and non-functional art pottery.

Here are some of her wonderful works...
http://www.cynthiabringlepottery.com/

I've been so pleased to see Cynthia's work at various shows in NC.  And I've actually met her a few times, when visiting Penland. 

If you haven't had a chance to go there, please put it on your bucket list...about an hour's drive north of Asheville and Black Mountain.  There are open houses available several times a year, classes in all craft disciplines, and a gallery of gorgeous goodies.

information is here
http://penland.org/about/description.html 


 

Mary Louise McLaughlin, American cerramist

America held their first World’s Fair, the “International Exposition of 1876” commonly known as the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia.  The Civil War was over.  People wanted to move on, to show the world our best.  And we invited the world to stand beside us, show us their best. 

American women were especially motivated by this watershed event.  For many it began with china painting, the first true ‘ceramic-art’ movement in the US.  Two presidential wives and many future leaders in the movement began as china painters.  But any list of Art Pottery leaders must begin with Mary Louise McLaughlin and Maria Longworth Nichols.

Mary Louise McLaughlin’s Centennial experience motivated her to spearhead in 1879 the Queen City OH Pottery Club, aka The Cincinatti Pottery Club, America’s first all-women’s pottery organization.  Her efforts set the stage for Rookwood and the blossoming of Art Pottery in Cincinnati.  Rookwood Pottery was founded in 1880 by Maria Longworth Nichols, another Centennial convert.  No other pottery matched Rookwood’s uniquely American style.

Mary Louise McLaughlin

But there were many others; Newcomb Pottery in New Orleans founded specifically to instruct young women; Mary Chase Stratton’s Pewabic Pottery in Detroit; Linna Irelan’s Art Pottery in San Francisco, CA, which exclusively used native Californian clays.  These and many more set the stage for Adelaide Alsop Robineau’s porcelain work beginning in 1904 and culminating in her magisterial Scarab Vase.  The stage was set for America’s Arts and Crafts revolution.

(source: thisdayinpotteryhistory.)

MARY LOUISE MCLAUGHLIN, 1847-1939

She wrote a best selling self-help book on china painting in two weeks. 

At the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia,  Mary Louise McLaughlin examined the art pottery of France's Havilland & Co. where the decorations were painted under the glaze, not over the glaze. This technical advancement was important to ceramic decorators and McLaughlin desired to develop this technique.  It took a year before the materials arrived from France, and in 1877 she began experimenting and in three months discovered the secrets to underglaze painting. 

Mary Louise McLaughlin, Losanti Vase, 1892

 In 1895, she patented a technique for inlay decoration in pottery. In 1898 she built a kiln in her back yard and became the first American to work in studio porcelain, the most difficult of all clays. This phenomenal woman came out of early Americana, but gave methodology to future studio potters.

(source: Jayne Shatz)

The Ali Baba vase, M.L. McLaughlin, 1880

Her biography, by Anita Ellis, "The Ceramic Career of M. Louise McLaughlin" is the first definitive study dedicated to her accomplishments.

Anita Ellis depicts the many challenges McLaughlin encountered in pursuit of her ultimately successful career. Not the least of these was her rivalry with the formidable Maria Longworth Nichols, fellow Cincinnatian and founder of the Rookwood Pottery Company. Another was that of being a woman in the arts: her primary goal had been to paint portraits on canvas, but Victorian society did not afford opportunities in what was considered a male sphere.

Background on the book: Deputy director of curatorial affairs at the Cincinnati Art Museum, Anita J. Ellis is the author of "Rookwood Pottery: The Glorious Gamble", which won the Florence Roberts Head Book of the Year Award, and "Rookwood Pottery: The Glaze Lines."

(See tomorrow's blog focusing on Maria Longworth Nichols of the Rookwood Pottery)
 ___________________

And for today's quote from a woman artist:

"The mountains are never still.
Over her skin, the power is moving,
the dragon traveling, timeless, shining.

Annelinde Metzner, April 12, 2010 

"In Love with the Rooted Earth"

American Art Potteries



AMERICAN ART POTTERIES

The age of the American Art Potteries flourished at a time when not only was our country experiencing a surge in manufacturing, but also an ecliptic escalation in artistic creativity. The flowery, yet somewhat decadent motifs of European Art Nouveau brought about a diverse amalgamation into the sleek clean lines of Modernism and Art Deco.

The American Art Potteries acclaimed worldwide attention to ceramic wares that were being produced in our country. Suddenly, individual artists were becoming as well known as the industriously producing potteries. In the latter part of the 19th century, men would throw master vessels and molds would be created for mass production of their work. Then, women were hired as decorators, painting artistic masterpieces on the ceramic forms. These art potteries gained notoriety primarily for their decorators.

Rookwood Vase

There was also a high interest in china painting by the ladies who wanted something to divert their art pursuits from watercoloures and still remain categorized as "ladies."  I learned early in my childhood that the cleaning lady was not a proper use of the term "lady".  My mother, born in 1917, must have learned that from her grandmother, who raised her.  However, when I was supporting my son and myself in art school, (in the 1980s) I gladly was a cleaning lady!

Rookwood Vase

Being a decorator was one of the few areas of employment that was considered respectable for a woman in the male dominated American clay industry. Many women became decorators just to be able to have a chance to work outside the home. Rookwood Pottery developed into one of the finest art potteries in the world that employed mostly women.



An interesting and successful American Art Pottery was the extraordinary Arequipa Sanatorium, which functioned from 1911-1918. This unique pottery functioned predominately  by the work of female tuberculosis patients.

After the 1906 earthquake and fires of San Francisco, the dust and ash filled air created a tuberculosis epidemic. Dr. Philip King Brown founded the Arequipa Sanatorium as a country retreat for women to recuperate from tuberculosis.

Besides bed rest, handcrafting pottery was seen as a therapeutic activity that provided work for these women, thus diminishing the stigma of charity. This philosophy complemented the bourgeoning ideals of the Arts and Crafts Movement in America. This movement, which originated in England, supported the production of hand made objects over those mass-produced by industry. 

By the late 1850’s there were a great many art potteries; the work became very decorative rather than utilitarian and ultimately became a leading collectible. The Art Potteries became the foundation for women’s re-emergence into the ceramic scene. Several women were able to evolve beyond solely being decorators; they began producing the ceramic forms as well as decorating them. These women became the earliest studio potters.  (source, Jayne Shatz)

Unfortunately for those of us interested in following an artist's style, there are seldom any names designated for the Art Pottery decorators on their wares.  Some of these potters have been identified in museums by consistent styles however.  The Mint Museum in Charlotte, NC has a good collection of these wares.

Rookwood Pottery

We have already looked at Adelaide Alsop Robineau, who became much more than a "decorator" and advanced clay art immensely.  Soon I'll share some pictures and details about several other women clay artists from the early 20th century.

Arequipa ware, 1911-1918

TOSHIKO TAKAEZU

TOSHIKO TAKAEZU, b. 1929

Toshiko Takaezu was born in Hawaii of Japanese decent, and has been working in clay for over forty years. She moved from producing functional vessels to abstract sculptural forms. Over the years she has merged the aesthetics of the East and the West, as well as her love of the natural world.

Throughout her career, Toshiko has focused on the enclosed vessel, which has become a symbol of her work. Her earlier pieces were almost exclusively wheel-thrown, but she began envisioning larger forms. With these forms she incorporated hand-building techniques that allowed her to build larger vessels and stray from the restrictions of the wheel. The  simple structures are united by form but gain individual character through her painterly surface decoration. Toshiko’s spontaneous approach to glazing occurs as she walks around the vessel freely applying glaze through pouring and painting.

Gaea Moon Pots, 1979, 30"-33" d.

Uariramba, 1970.

Toshiko says, “In my life I see no difference between making pots, cooking, and growing vegetables.They are all so related.However there is a need for me to work in clay.It is so gratifying and I get so much joy from it, and it gives me many answers in my life.”

Light,  36" h. 1970 

Toshiko ‘s love of teaching has been a great contribution to the ceramic field. Her passion for clay is infectious, and she has continually shared this enthusiasm. While teaching at Princeton University for 23 years and presenting workshops throughout the world, she always had time for generations of apprentices. Among the many awards she has achieved, her greatest achievements were the Hawaii Living Treasure Award and an honorary doctorate degree from the University of Princeton. She has been an inspiration to many through her work and life’s contributions.

--------------------------------------------

I had to create an equivalent for what I felt about what I was looking at - not copy it. Georgia O'Keeffe

Maria Martinez

I decided that if I could paint that flower in a huge scale, you could not ignore its beauty. Georgia O'Keeffe

___________________________

MARIA MARTINEZ, 1887-1980

"As we move forward in the discussion of women’s role in the ceramic field,

we recognize the legacy of Maria Martinez, who revitalized the lost art form

of Native American pottery making. Her work, born from an ancient tradition, exhibits the life of a people that once populated most of our country. Today, Maria and other Native American potter's work can be seen in museums worldwide.

Maria was schooled only to the fourth grade. She was born in the San Ildefonso Pueblo, a Tewa-speaking community on the eastern bank of the Río Grande about 20 miles northwest of Santa Fe. Archaeologists believe that this village existed at that location since the 1300’s and was populated by descendants of those who once inhabited the canyons and cliffs of the Pajarito Plateau.

"In 1880, a Smithsonian Institution collecting expedition headed by James Stevenson visited San Ildefonso, but Stevenson found very little pottery. He noticed that these people were spending most of their time in subsistence farming and almost totally abandoned the manufacture of pottery making. San Ildefonso had become increasingly depopulated since the arrival of the Spanish and then again when the United States government took over. By 1900, only 138 people lived in the pueblo.

"Tin and enamel pots and pails replaced the pueblo’s ceramic tradition of finely painted black-on-cream ware. A cultural revival would soon be sparked by Martinez’s deep love for clay.

"Maria’s husband Julian gathered, hauled, and purified her clay before she began mixing it. By 1919, Maria began producing the black-on-black pottery that would make her world-famous. Although black ware had been found at archaeological sites, the firing method that produced it had been lost. The couple began experiments to recreate the polychrome ware that was the most common form of pottery found on the plateau. They revived a unique Tewa way of firing at zero oxidation that had gone out of existence. At a certain point in the firing they smothered the pot with cow dung and let it bake and smoke for several hours.

"Maria demonstrated pottery making at the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904, where she sold her pots for 50 cents or a dollar. Today, her pots garner more than a quarter of a million dollars at auction. Maria also demonstrated her pottery making at the San Diego World's Fair in 1915. She received the Best of Show at the Century of Progress; Chicago World's Fair in 1933 and was invited to the White House by President Theodore Roosevelt. In 1939 she made her pottery at the San Francisco World's Fair. Her work was included in two European tours between 1955 and 1961. 
from Jayne Shatz




-------------

Feather bowl, $6900

MORE...

"San Ildefonso Pueblo is a quiet community located 20 miles northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Inhabited since A.D. 1300, the pueblo saw many changes that resulted in a rich culture, in which today ancient traditions mix with Spanish festivals and Anglo conveniences.

Maria Antonia Montoya was probably born in the year 1887 and died in 1980.

"All her life she lived in the pueblo and eagerly shared with visitors and her neighbors and family her passion in being a potter.

"Excavations of 1908 and 1909, led by Dr. Edgar Lee Hewett (who was also the director of the Museum of New Mexico), produced examples of many pre-historic pottery techniques. Dr. Hewett asked Maria to replicate these pieces in the same polychrome form they had been found.

"It was then that Maria and her husband, Julian (who painted the designs on the pottery after Maria shaped them), began an artistic collaboration that would last throughout their lives together.

"Maria and Julian refined their pottery techniques and were asked to demonstrate their craft at several expositions, including the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair, the 1914 Panama-California Exposition in San Diego, and the 1934 Chicago World's fair. Part of their success came from their innovations in the style of black-on-black ware

"The process for the creation of this ware begins with a batch of clay that is mixed and has set for a few days, a "pancake" of clay is formed and pressed into a puki, beginning the process of building a pot. The puki is a bowl-shaped form that supports the bottom of the pot as it is being built. Most commonly, pots are formed with a coil technique, in which long snake-shaped coils are circled around the base of the pot and blended together to create the walls of the vessel. A potter's wheel is not used in traditional pueblo pottery making. When the height and the amount of clay are just right, the walls of the pot are smoothed and shaped into curves with pieces of gourd, called kajepes.

"The pot is left to partially dry after the form is completed. In its semi-dried state, the pot is ready to be scraped, which refines the shape and removes any irregularity. Then the pot is sanded with sandpaper to rid it of any grit. The red slip is applied next, and the pot must be burnished with a stone before the slip dries completely. This step is most critical for the glossy nature of the black wares.

"A decoration is painted onto the polished surface, resulting in matte areas once the piece is fired.

"Traditionally the men of the pueblo do the painting, but women were taught the process and painted during the times that the men had left the pueblo for work. Julian replicated and was inspired by many pre-historic designs. He was fond of many motifs, using ancient symbols in new combinations. He often painted the avanyu, the horned water serpent, which he saw as a symbol for the rush of water after a hard rain, and as a metaphor for the pueblo itself.

"Black wares become so in the firing process. This labor-intensive task is done after many pots have been made, to maximize efficiency. Wood and dried cow manure are piled around an iron grill, upon which the pottery has been carefully stacked. The pile is lit and left to burn for a specified amount of time, until the fire has reached its maximum heat. At this time the fire is smothered with ash or fresh manure, producing a smoke-filled reducing atmosphere that turns the pots black. Variations in the process can produce pottery with black areas and red areas, which are also popular.

"For many years, Maria and Julian produced their pottery together amid raising a family and carrying out traditional duties for the pueblo. Their children were taught the importance of the craft, and they participated in various ways. After Julian's death in 1943, Maria began working with her daughter-in-law Santana. Santana provided the painted decoration that was her father-in-law's legacy. After 1956, Maria also worked with her son Popovi Da. It was Popovi who helped market her work, built a shop at the pueblo, and spoke about the pottery tradition of San Ildefonso at lectures across the country.

"One of the family's most innovative potters is Maria's grandson Tony Da. Tony combined sculptural techniques with traditional forms to create unique forms. Due to a motorcycle accident, Tony no longer makes pottery, but he continues to work as a painter. Many other family members and people from San Ildefonso continue to make pottery, carrying on the tradition so openly shared by Maria.

"Although you may see similar styles of the black on black pottery in pueblo art, remember the true artist who reintroduced it in modern times- Maria Martinez .

by Eileen Richardson

Primitive pottery vs industry

"There are places throughout the world, such as this community in Funjoho, Africa, that still employ primitive techniques to create their work.

Remember that in art, "primitive" doesn't have to do with lack of intelligence or skill, but simply is a term people "who spend a lot of time in classrooms" use to describe people "who spend a lot of time in nature."   In the case of Grandma Moses, she was considered a Primitive artist, a person who didn't have her education through  classrooms but rather through her own experiences.

African pottery...

A woman making pottery in Funjoho, Africa

A pit fired pot by Colleen O'Sullivan in New York, America, 2007.

Jayne Shatz shares...
"WE NEED TO UNDERSTAND THAT SEVERAL CENTURIES ELAPSED in which women were not making a substantial amount of pottery; men took over traditional pottery manufacturing and turned it into an industry. This is just a fraction of time in the total history of ceramic production. Ancient women potters produced great work from 27,000 BPE until about 1500 BPE. That constitutes 25,000 years of clay production. Viewed in this light, the period between 1500 BPE to 1800 PE (Present Era), represents 3000 years out of a total of 25,000 years that women have been working in clay. By the late 1800’s, women re-emerged onto the ceramic scene, working in art potteries, schools, private studios and industry. Their enduring presence ascended into the ceramic oeuvre once more!

Primitive pottery was a continuing practice among Indigenous peoples throughout the world.  Today (2011) if you "google" primitive pottery, you will find quite a few classes that teach all over the United States how to make this style..."primitive pottery."

Women's History Month

You already know I'm a fan of women potters...so be prepared for more to be showcased here.  I started talking about Karen Karnes having an exhibit in the museum in Asheville...and here's a bit more info about her. 

Another woman will be featured each day of March, or till I run out of them...unlikely!

KAREN KARNES, b. 1925

Karen Karnes was a dominant force in the beginning of the crafts movement during the early 1950's. She has influenced generations of potters and is widely recognized as a ceramic educator, although she never taught through traditional college programs.

Karen's parents were Jewish immigrant garment workers from Russia and Poland, and raised their daughter in a housing project in Bronx, NY.  She studied at Brooklyn College's Art Department where she developed artistically, leaning towards the proponents of the Bauhaus. Karen did not work with clay until she married David Weinrib. He brought clay home for her and thus changed the direction of her life. Karen soon began earning her living as a studio potter.

Karen was a Potter in Residence, teaching at Black Mountain College.  She then taught at the Penland School of Crafts and Haystack. She left teaching in the 1960’s, becoming an influential participant in Stony Point, N.Y., an artist community founded on communal living and art production. It was there that she lived and worked for 25 years, establishing herself as one of the leading ceramists in America

A great tragedy occurred for Karen when a fire destroyed her house and studio in l998. From the love of potters all over country, financial support flowed in which enabled her to rebuild her life and studio. She has worked in clay for over 60 years, and continues to produce beautiful artwork in her Vermont studio. Her work is in major collections throughout the world.

Potters who came before us

I just discovered another potter had posted this link for a great little video about a potter who I wish I'd known about sooner.  Now I'm off to find out more about her...

Click here to see the video on YouTube Beatrice Wood


Background:

 BEATRICE WOOD was born in San Francisco in 1893 and passed away in Ojai, California nine days after her 105th birthday on March 12, 1998. She attributed her longevity to "young men and chocolates."

Wood sspent time in Paris during her late teens. Studying art briefly at the Academie Julian, she was soon attracted to the stage and moved to the Comedie Francaise. She returned to the United States in 1914 and joined the French Repertory Theater in New York. While visiting the French composer Edgar Varese in a New York hospital in 1916, she was introduced to Marcel Duchamp. She soon became an intimate friend of the painter and a member of his recherche culturelle clique, which included Francis Picabia, Man Ray, Albert Gleizes, Walt Kuhn, and others. As a contributor to Duchamp's avant-garde magazines, Rogue and the Blindman, she produced drawings and shared editorial space with such luminaries of the day as Gertrude Stein. In 1933, after she purchased a set of six luster plates in Europe, she returned to America and wanted to produce a matching teapot. It was suggested that she make one at the pottery classes of the Hollywood High School. Of course, she would later laugh about that weekend and reminisce about how foolish she was in thinking she could produce a lustre teapot in one weekend. But she was hooked. She began to read everything she could get her hands on concerning ceramics. Around 1938 she studied with Glen Lukens at the USC, and in 1940 with the Austrian potters Gertrud and Otto Natzler. She remembers being "the most interested student in [Lukens's] class and certainly the least gifted...." "I was not a born craftsman. Many with natural talent do not have to struggle, they ride on easy talent and never soar. But I worked and worked, obsessed with learning." From that time on, Wood developed a personal and uniquely expressive art form with her lusterwares. Her sense of theater is still vividly alive in these works, with their exotic palette of colors and unconventional form. In 1983 the Art Galleries of California State University at Fullerton organized a large retrospective of the artist's sixty-six years of activity as an artist. Remarkably, it was during the artist's nineties that Wood produced some of her finest work including her now signature works, tall complex, multi-volumed chalices in glittering golds, greens, pinks and bronzes. Until shortly before her death she was producing at least two one-woman exhibitions a year and the older she became, the more daring and experimental her work was.

Wood received numerous honors. She was given the Ceramics Symposium Award of the Institute for Ceramic History in 1983 and the outstanding-achievement award of the Women's Caucus for Art in 1987, the year she was made a fellow of both the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts and the American Craft Council which also gave her the gold medal on her 100th birthday. She also received the Governor's Award for Art in 1994, and was made a "living treasure of California" by the state in 1984. Wood took part in hundreds of exhibitions both solo and group since the 1930's ranging from small craft shows, to showing on the Venice Biennale. From 1981 until her death, she was represented by the Garth Clark Gallery. In 1990, her close friend and art historian Francis Naumann organized a major retrospective of her figurative work which appeared at the Oakland Museum and The Craft and Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles. In 1997 the American Craft Museum organized "Beatrice Wood: A Centennial Tribute," a touring exhibition. In 1985 Wood published her autobiography, I Shock Myself . She continued to write, publishing many books. In 1993 she was the subject of an award winning film Beatrice Wood: Mama of Dada by Lone Wolf Productions.

Beatrice Wood continued to throw on the wheel until June, 1997. She achieved some of her best lustre works in the 90s. Her last figurative work, "Men With Their Wives" was completed in December 1996 and is currently in a private collection in California.

Source: YouTube