After getting my MFA in Ceramics I briefly taught at Albion College, and then moved to some family property in Northern Michigan, where I set up a studio and began making pots full time, at first selling mostly to gift shops and galleries around the country and then, with later work, selling mostly to individuals at art fairs or from a small gallery next to my studio.

I'd always been interested in treating clay like fabric, and my first production work certainly reflected this.  Working with colored 

porcelains, I decorated thin slabs with tiny dots of contrasting colored clay to attain a 'quilted' look and then folded and gathered them to achieve the look of softly draped fabric.  The resulting pieces were painstakingly constructed - a cup had as many as 40 additions of clay and teapot as many as 150.

After the popularity of feminine porcelains faded, I began working with stoneware. It wasn't nearly as fussy as porcelain, and made a welcome change.  It too was very successful, but I never felt very creative with it, and after several incredibly productive years I decided it was time to start making pieces again that were more artistically challenging. 

In 2001, I began playing around with leaf impressed, handbuilt forms, and discovered a whole new world of possibilities.  In some cases I treat each individual leaf shape as a pattern piece, joining leaves together at the seams to make three-dimensional vessels.  Other pieces are assembled by overlapping or wrapping leaves to form interesting or unique shapes.   Most of these pieces are available in either stoneware or porcelain. 

I still live in an old stone tenant house on my great-grandparents' farm, fixing it and other buildings when I have the time and money.  My mother, one brother and his family, an aunt and a cousin, also transplanted Washingtonians, also live on the property in their own homes, and in 1998 we celebrated the 100th anniversary of the family farm.

In my spare time, I read as much as possible, garden, and enjoy the lakes in the summer.  I've also started raising some very lovely chickens, the 'ladies', and spoil them rotten whenever I can; in return, they present me with their lovely eggs every day, and try to follow me wherever I go.   I also spend a lot of time with my family, collect as much old furniture as I can fit into the old buildings to restore later and, whenever possible, travel.

It's really all quite wonderful, this life of mine.


 2019/2020 Show Schedule


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