Details

About Me

Introduction	Hello! My name is Kelly and I am here to learn, learn, learn! I taught art to elementary and middle school students for 16 years and currently work as a Professional School Counselor at a 100% virtual public school. I’ll be retiring in about 4 years and want to get back to my art with an emphasis on working with clay. Because it’s been so long since I’ve actually created anything, I’m ready to get back to it and soak up as much knowledge as I can while making connections in the ceramics/clay community.
What I Love about Ceramics	For what ever reason, I feel connected to the earth when working with clay. There is just something about getting your hands dirty! I find it soothing. It’s also fun to watch a “ball of dirt” transformed into something fun, useful, beautiful, etc.
How I started with ceramics	Well, right now I’m starting over. In high school, I remember watching a film about a potter working on the wheel and remember thinking to myself, “I’m going to learn to do that!. My major in college was interior design with a minor in art so I took a few ceramics classes and fulfilled the goal of learning how to throw. Then life took over and working with clay was lost to working/teaching and raising a child. The closest I came to working with ceramics during this time came through teaching childern about art and always including a unit on ceramics. Children seem natually drawn to building clay forms and it was a joy to see them creating. Now I’m ready to tap into that joy myself.
What inspires me	I’m inspired by talking to and learning from others. I also find it greatly inspirational to meet people who just jump in to things without looking back and who put fear of failure on the back burner. Or perhaps the fear is there, but understand that making mistakes (failures) is just a big part of the learning process. I love color, pattern and texture and the simple joy of taking it all in visually.
What I'm working on at the moment	At the moment, I’m just here to learn. I guess you could say I’m working on me as an artist. Right now, I’m most interested in handbuilding forms, mostly boxes and lidded vessels. I’m curious to see where this takes me.