In order to endure the constant visual bombardment of the information age, I find it necessary to call on empty spaces in nature to find stillness and silence to reflect and regenerate. Coming from the crowded Rust Belt, I am enamored with the vast, quiet landscape of the Northwest and its ability to possess the beholder so thoroughly that the anxious husk of daily life is peeled away and only wonder remains. I aim to distill theses meditative moments into functional objects, the surface of a pot acting as a small, personal landscape, to be explored by sight and touch, offering up a tiny place to ruminate and ponder amid the clamor of modern life. My color palette is influenced by the rich colors of Alaska and Montana: the low-angled, honey-laden light that casts the mountains into shades of pink and purple, the aquamarine glint of glacial ice, the orange lichen that covers alpine rocks like rust on a coal car. The uneven peaks of a pinched seam and tool marks intentionally left behind capture the memory of still-malleable clay. Textures resembling rock and parched earth give the hands a tactile world to explore while colored clay inclusions speckle the surface like polychromatic lichen, creating variation remeniscent of my woodfiring-roots. My forms are inspired by the architectural landscape of my Pittsburgh childhood, with elements of exaggeration in line and shape borrowed from skateboard graphics, the flow of a well built skate park, and graffiti. It is through a combination of color, texture, and form inspired by beauty found in both the city and wilderness that I hope to make a landscape that is a refuge for the viewer during the rhythm of daily use.
