All my life I have busied myself as an artist, therefore I have never been bored and am usually happy. In high school my spending money was earned doing pen and ink drawings for a stationary company and murals and signs for the shops in my small town, Watertown, Wisconsin. At the U. of Wisconsin, Madison, I majored in Fine Arts then finished my degree at U.C. Berkeley in 1958. After starting out in the two dimensional world of painting and printmaking and six years as a graphic artist in the print industry, I found my true home in the 3-D muddy world of clay. In 1966 I took my first classes from Jane Wherrete and Maxine Gorton , Mercer Island potters. Since 1978 I have been affiliated with Seward Park Clay Studio as a student, occasional teacher, resident artist, board member and its president. I have been a member of MIVAL since the 1970’s and recently a member of the MIVAL Gallery. Since the 1980’s, I have been a member of the Washington Potters Association and have exhibited regionally including many juried and invitational shows.
Although I began throwing functional pottery on the wheel, I now exclusively hand build. I am intrigued with the asymmetry and the infinite variety of shapes that coil, slab, carving and pounding can produce. Most of my work is high fired to cone ten in a gas kiln. Occasionally I do raku, saggar, pit firing and low fire oxidation for special effects. My art has gone through many phases over the 48 years including female forms, birds, rocks, carved eggs, fruit and gourds and large vessels. What has remained constant is an emphasis on earth related forms and voluptuous round shapes with minimal color to allow the texture and form to be the interest.
Currently, most of my work is inspired by the artifacts, pottery techniques and vessel shapes of the Native American cultures of the Four Corners. My fascination with the ruins and petroglyphs of the Anasazi led to research and classes with Pueblo potters. In my pieces, I attempt to evoke a feeling of cliffs, rocks and deserts of the Southwest while incorporating designs based on ancient drawings. My intention is not to duplicate the art but to be influenced by it and add my aesthetic to that history.