Reginald Pointer is based in Washington DC where he teaches ceramics and printmaking at Howard University. He has taught art at Grambling State University, a workshop at Penland School of Crafts, and the Duke Ellington School of the Arts. He is the creator of the Clay Hero’s comic book and numerous ceramic games for enjoyment and learning with clay. He earned his MFA from Florida State University and a BFA from Howard University. The range of persons being taught over the many years stretches from persons with disabilities, toddlers, teenagers, senior citizens, and college students.

Ehren Tool is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley. is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley.

Lauren Chipeur is an artist based in Calgary on Treaty 7 Territory. She makes material and site-responsive installations that engage ceramic processes as a way to untangle the complexity of the material world.

Sharon Virtue has worked with clay for over 35 years. She began in the UK with a BA in Fine Art. In 1998 at Ruby’s Clay Studio in San Francisco, she developed the Mud Bus project, a community outreach program. Since 2001, she has worked on community projects in Africa, the Caribbean, UK and Brazil. She was AIR at the De Young Museum where she built an earth architecture project. Awarded a Travel grant from NCECA she worked in Northern Ghana on coil building techniques. She completed an MA in Community Arts from Goldsmiths University, while also being the studio manager of Turning Earth, the first open access ceramic studio in London. Sharon is also a teacher at The Potter’s Studio.

Will be updated in coming days

Ianna Frisby is a Sacramento artist and art professor who works in Sacramento and maintains a studio at Verge Center for the Arts. She received her BFA from Humboldt State University in 1998 and her MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2005.

Ehren Tool is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley. is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley.

Lauren Chipeur is an artist based in Calgary on Treaty 7 Territory. She makes material and site-responsive installations that engage ceramic processes as a way to untangle the complexity of the material world.

Solomon or "Zully" Adler is a PhD candidate in Contemporary Art History and Theory at Oxford University's Ruskin School. His research follows the work of artist Martin Wong through the late 20th century, as he navigated the realms of vernacular art, counterculture, and American street life.

Maria Mia Salazar is a Marine Corps veteran, having served during Operation Iraqi freedom. She is a sculptor and visual artist. Salazar is the founder of Claymore Vets, a nonprofit whose C4 mission is to Cultivate a Connected and Creative Community of Veterans, First Responders and Artists roster in ceramics and visual arts to foster reconnection and post-traumatic growth. Their aim is to shift the paradigm of the explosions-reactive veteran. They were trained to be war machines but, at their core, they are creators.

The Veterans Art Project advocates for Artmaking that creates mental wealth and community. In 2020, VETART was awarded a multiyear California Statewide contract for Mental Health and wellness for Veterans through innovation funding by the Mental Health Services Oversight & Accountability Commission, a California State Agency.

Che Ochtli began working in clay three years ago, and is interested in connecting to the earth and a forgotten ancestral past. Historically his work has been rooted in medical advocacy, equity, diversity, and inclusion as well as data analysis and visualization. He was drawn to the Green Task Force to learn how to create more sustainable ceramic practices that honor the land, his roots, and community. He is currently exploring ceramics as a narrative to tell stories with the goal of exploring the intersection of art, culture, and green practices to create a community that is inclusive and accessible.

Brian Kohl is a ceramic artist and Assistant Professor of Ceramics at Riverside City College in Southern California. In the summers he works as a whitewater rafting guide currently on the Middle Fork of the Salmon River in Idaho. In under-graduate school Kohl became aware of water issues in the west through a letter writing campaign for the Wilderness Heritage Act in California to designate 246 rivers in the state as Wild and Scenic. It was this catalyst that led him to research art as activism and paved the path to creating installations dealing with the number of dams in various states across the country. His work includes imagery from hydro-electric projects, pipes, and water fixtures juxtaposed against landscapes and the natural world.

Kelsie Tyson is an artist based in Lewisburg, West Virginia. She earned her MFA in Ceramics from Temple University. Tyson aims to brighten folks' understanding of body size, shape, and color through the history of fatness in Appalachia—exploring how the struggle for Fat Liberation connects with Queer and Black Liberation.

Kenni Field is a queer Black millennial ceramicist based in Lenapehoking (Philadelphia) making functional ceramics. Field is primarily self-taught and has worked as a studio technician, production assistant, and educator. They run a small batch ceramics business and are working to found a BIPOC centered artist collective for under-resourced artists.

Sam Tubiolo’s sculpture and public art themes include human presence, passage of time, and sense of place. He holds a BFA from Rochester Institute of Technology, an MFA from the University of New Mexico, and is a retired professor of Ceramics at Sierra College, Nevada County Campus.

Virgil Ortiz is one of the most avant-garde artists of his time. With a career spanning four decades, Ortiz’s artistry extends across various media and boundaries—challenging societal expectations and breaking taboos. His vision fuses his Pueblo culture with sci-fi, fantasy, and apocalyptic themes, yielding imagery that is both provocative and futuristic. Ortiz’s works are exhibited in museum collections worldwide, including Fondation Cartier pour I’art Contemporain, Smithsonian Institution, Minneapolis Institute of Art, and Denver Art Museum.

Jane Rekedal is a professional studio potter and student of Marguerite Wildenhain. Her 47 years of studio practice reflect the Pond Farm traditions advanced by her own contemporary style and interests. Her sculptures and functional wares echo a lifelong study of nature and immersion in the pottery of world cultures.

Dr. Billie Sessions is Professor Emerita of Art at CSUSB. Her Marguerite Wildenhain Ripples exhibition traveled from Southern California to Utah State University, and Alfred University. She was Project Director and author in Common Ground: Ceramics in Southern California 1945–1975. Sessions has received Fulbright, NEA, NEH, and Getty grants.

Kathleen Kennedy holds an MA in History and Humanities. She worked for a private cultural resources consulting firm before becoming a State Historian with the California State Parks. She provides guidance for the preservation and protection of historic resources and coordinates nominations to the National Register and National Historic Landmarks.

Dolores Huerta is a civil rights activist and community organizer. She has worked for labor rights and social justice for over 50 years. In 1962, she and Cesar Chavez founded the United Farm Workers union. She served as Vice President and played a critical role in many of the union’s accomplishments for four decades. In 2002, she received the Puffin/Nation $100,000 prize for Creative Citizenship which she used to establish the Dolores Huerta Foundation (DHF). DHF is connecting groundbreaking community-based organizing to state and national movements to register and educate voters; advocate for education reform; bring about infrastructure improvements in low-income communities; advocate for greater equality for the LGBT community; and create strong leadership development. She has received numerous awards: among them The Eleanor Roosevelt Humans Rights Award from President Clinton in 1998. In 2012 President Obama bestowed Dolores with The Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the United States.

Courtney M. Leonard is a Shinnecock artist and filmmaker who explores marine biology, Indigenous food sovereignty, migration, and human environmental impact. In Leonard’s current projects, she articulates the multiple definitions of the term breach and investigates and documents Indigenous communities’ historical ties to water, marine life, and native cultures of subsistence.

Reginald Pointer lives and works in Washington DC where he teaches ceramics and printmaking at Howard University. In addition to working at Howard he has taught art at Grambling State University, a workshop at Penland School of Crafts, and the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, a local high school located in Washington DC. He is the creator of the Clay Hero’s comic book and numerous ceramic games for enjoyment and learning with clay. His interests are not limited to ceramics, but also cartooning, printmaking, mixed-media sculpture, and origami as well. He earned his MFA from Florida State University and a BFA from Howard University. Pointer has also benefited greatly from taking numerous workshops and assisting in various classes at Penland. The range of persons being taught over the many years stretches from persons with disabilities, toddlers, teenagers, senior citizens, and college students.

Ehren Tool is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley. is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley.

Lauren Chipeur is an artist based in Calgary on Treaty 7 Territory. She makes material and site-responsive installations that engage ceramic processes as a way to untangle the complexity of the material world.

Zelal Basodan is a Saudi emerging ceramicist who holds a BA and MA in Islamic Arts, from King Abdul-Aziz University, Saudi Arabia, where she also worked from 2009–2018, in addition to working at Jeddah University since 2018. Simultaneously, she is a Doctoral Researcher at Loughborough University, UK, exploring the emerging field of Islamic Studio Ceramics.

In a ceramics class in 1969, I was given an assignment to make a mask. Even though I was given more and different assignments, I continue to make masks whenever I touch clay. As all of us are alike and different in many ways, so are my masks.

Michelle Ettrick was a non-English speaking 13-year old when she arrived in the United States in 1982. Life in Brooklyn, New York, was a stark contrast to her early memories of Panama and the simple joys of climbing trees and playing with my friends while her mom was nearby hanging clothes on the line. “As an Afro-Latina, I struggled to find a community that would accept me and where I felt I belonged. I love being a maker and clay is my medium of choice. Clay is very personal material to me. When I put my hands in the clay, and my fingers get lost in the mixture, for the moment, we become one. I stretch, pull, pinch and form shapes where I leave evidence of my having been there. I follow up by drawing on my work, embracing my natural curly hair, heritage, womanhood, and at times current worldly struggles. My artwork is a record of my experiences as an Afro-Latina American.”

Born and raised in the border city of El Paso, Texas, George Rodriguez creates humorous decorative ceramic sculpture, addressing his identity and community. He earned a BFA from the University of Texas El Paso and an MFA from the University of Washington. Rodriguez is represented by Foster/White Gallery in Seattle.

Adam Chau is an artist in Cold Spring, New York. A graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, his research blends digital manufacturing with traditional studio techniques. In 2018, he received the NCECA Emerging Artist Award and in 2019 he became a member of the International Academy of Ceramics.

Sienna Orlando-Lalaguna is the owner and maker behind Sienna Ceramics, and the founder of Strega Studios in Chico, California. She designs and creates a line of pottery for farm-to-table living and the appreciation of food, as well as sculpture inspired by the natural world, and a deep connection to plants.

Jennifer Azzariti is an artist and educator working in early childhood education, specifically in programs inspired by the Reggio Approach. As an atelierista and pedagogical director, her focus is on professional development, particularly the potential of the role of materials as languages for learning and expression.

Qwist Joseph holds a BFA from Colorado State University and an MFA from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. In 2019, he completed a residency at the Roswell Artist-in-Residence Program and was named a 2019 NCECA Emerging Artist. Recently, his work was included in the Officine Saffi Exhibition in Milan, Italy.

Jennifer Ling Datchuk is an Assistant Professor of Studio Art at Texas State University in San Marcos. Datchuk holds an MFA in Artisanry from the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth and a BFA in Crafts from Kent State University in Ohio. In 2020, she was named a United States Artist Fellow in Craft.

Akiko Jackson is from Kahuku, Hawaii, a rural north-shore community on the island of O'ahu.
She holds an MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University and is an artist in residence at the Clay Studio, Philadelphia. Exhibitions include the 4th World Ceramic Biennale Korea in Icheon.

Sharon Norwood is an artist of Jamaican ancestry working in painting and ceramics. Norwood earned a BFA from the University of South Florida and an MFA from Florida State University. She has exhibited extensively and most recently participated as artist in residence at the McColl Center for the Creative Arts.

The creative practice, research and teaching of Varuni Kanagasundaram, based in Melbourne, Australia, is an exploration of clay in a multidisciplinary manner to convey expression of displacement and migrant experience through the exploring of transience and uncertainty. The artist translates rituals of South Asia, considering intersections of materiality, agency of creator, place, and community.

An artist who’s been in residence at Anderson Ranch, Penland, Santa Fe Art Institute, the Vermont Studio Center, Tara Daly is a California ceramicist whose works have been exhibited at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Richmond Arts Center, Contemporary Craft Center, among other non-profit galleries nationally.

Daniel Dallabrida is a conceptual ceramicist. Un bel bugiardo. Survivor. He completed a Post-Bacc at SACI, Florence (2008), Italy, and an MFA at the California College of the Arts (2011). He has completed residencies at Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Singapore’s LASALLE College of the Arts, Fondazione Pistoletto, and Kala Art Institute. Presentations include Milan, Rome, Florence, Oakland, Singapore, Kansas City, Aspen, San Francisco. He lives with a partner in San Francisco and Tuscany.

Mary Catherine Bassett is Art Faculty at Laney College and Owner of Applied Contemporary gallery. She earned her MFA from RIT in 2012. MC has been an artist in residence at S12 in Bergen, Norway; and Penland School of Crafts. In her studio practice, she incorporates ceramic and glass to create abstract sculptural objects.

Marnia Johnston, MFA (CCA), is an interdisciplinary sculptor, creating projects exploring the ideological struggle between the life and social sciences. Johnston is a James Irvine Foundation Fellow, has three Diplomas of Honor from the World Ceramic Biennale, and was an artist-in-residence at Anderson Ranch and the John Michael Kohler Arts/Industry.

Kala Stein is an artist and educator working at the intersection of craft, design, and new technologies. Kala received her MFA from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University and was the Director of Sonoma Ceramics & Arts at Sonoma Community Center for the past 7 years. Her studio is located in Sonoma, California.

Juliana Wisdom is a Los Angeles-based artist. She earned her BFA from the University of Washington and MFA from Tyler School of Art and Architecture. She has presented on historical and contemporary issues in the decorative arts at institutions and academic conferences and shown artwork across the US.

Jason Vantomme started his ceramics journey more than 25 years ago in Evanston, Illinois, and continued studying and practicing in community studios across the US and Canada. In recent years, he and his wife established their own studio outside of Vancouver, British Columbia, where they currently live.

Mandy Parslow is a maker, educator, and researcher based in rural County Tipperary, Ireland. In her current practice, she explores perspectives on place through locally found materials—ceramic, organic and anthropological. She is lecturer in Ceramics at Limerick School of Art and Design.

Ruth Chambers earned her MFA from the University of Regina in 1994, where she is now a Professor in the Department of Visual Arts. In her porcelain sculptures, modeled through direct observation, she addresses ideas of attentive looking, beauty, consumption, and temporality. She also publishes writings about contemporary craft and ceramics theory.

Julia Krueger studied art history (BA) and Canadian art history (MA) at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario. She earned a BFA in Ceramics at the Alberta College of Art + Design (ACAD) in Calgary, Alberta, and a PhD in visual culture at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario.

Mireille Perron is an artist, writer, educator, and founder of the Laboratory of Feminist Pataphysics, which promotes social experiments that masquerade as artworks and events. She is Professor Emerita at Alberta University of the Arts, where, among other subjects, she taught Craft Theory. She lives and works in Calgary, Canada.

Amy Gogarty earned her MFA in 1990. She taught in Liberal Studies at the Alberta College of Art + Design in Calgary prior to relocating to Vancouver, where she works as an independent writer and artist. She is the author of more than 100 critical essays, reviews or presentations relating to visual art and craft practice.

Lisa Lockman is an artist and a Professor of Art at Nebraska Wesleyan University where she teaches ceramics and metalsmithing. Her current work, ceramic murals and vessels, is influenced by maternal ancestry and the exploration of new technologies utilized with clay.

Dr. Bonnie Kemske is a ceramic artist and writer. She publishes in the academic and non-academic press, and was Editor of Ceramic Review from 2010–2013. Her books include Kintsugi: The Poetic Mend and The Teabowl: East and West, both of which draw on her experience as a Japanese tea ceremony practitioner.

Bio Here..

Brooke Armstrong is an emerging ceramic sculptor residing in Missoula, Montana. She graduated from the University of Montana with an MFA, and she is excited to offer tips and tricks to students on how to make the most of their graduate school experience.

Marianne Chénard is a Canadian artist who articulates herself around a site-specific approach to installation, illustrating the human perceptual relationship with nature while exhibiting attentiveness to natural environment agency. She recently earned her MFA from Alfred University and is pleased to share her experience with the NCECA community.

Rice Evans is a multi-medium artist primarily working in clay and video living and working in Richmond, Virginia. Originally from the Midwest, Evans earned her BFA from Alfred University in 2016, and her MFA in Ceramics from Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) in 2021. Currently, she is an adjunct ceramics faculty at VCU.

Samuel Nortey is an artist and associate professor in the Department of Industrial Art (Ceramics Section), Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana. He holds a PhD in African Art and Culture. He recontextualizes materials and forms to engage viewers on social issues.

Jen Allen is a studio potter, mother, and educator in Morgantown, West Virginia. She earned her BFA from the University of Alaska, Anchorage; and her MFA from Indiana University, Bloomington.

Virgil Ortiz is one of the most avant-garde artists of his time. With a career spanning four decades, Ortiz’s artistry extends across various media and boundaries—challenging societal expectations and breaking taboos. His vision fuses his Pueblo culture with sci-fi, fantasy, and apocalyptic themes, yielding imagery that is both provocative and futuristic. Ortiz’s works are exhibited in museum collections worldwide, including Fondation Cartier pour I’art Contemporain, Smithsonian Institution, Minneapolis Institute of Art, and Denver Art Museum.

Award-winning curator, coach & cultural producer, Dr. Wendy Gers recently joined the Princessehof National Ceramics Museum as Curator of Modern and Contemporary Ceramics (Netherlands). She is also a Visiting Professor at the University of Sunderland (UK) and Research Associate at the University of Johannesburg (South Africa).

Irma Bijou is an American artist and a visual arts educator based in California, where she has resided for more than three decades. She has dedicated herself to the study and research of ceramics, teaching, and creating custom designed art programs, most of them in combination with information and tools to create environmental awareness and ecological sustainability while working with clay. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, and her works are part of national and international collections.

Joy Key is the Executive Director of Scenic City Clay Arts, a nonprofit community ceramics studio located in Chattanooga, Tennessee. With a mission of sharing access to all things clay through collaborative education, they serve more than 1,000 people each year with clay classes, programs, and a membership studio.

Amy Snider is an MFA candidate at the University of Regina, Canada. Her conceptual sculptures and installations represent the effects of climate change. Current work includes a series of ephemeral cups, bowls, and plates that represent melting glaciers and drought as they dissolve, crumble, and blow away.

Rachael Jones is a ceramic and mixed-media collaborative artist, born and raised in Helena, Montana. Her work has taken her to many diverse ecologies that have influenced her drive to advocate for ecological awareness and holistic sustainability. She currently teaches ceramics and drawing at St. Lawrence University in upstate New York.

Eliza Au is originally from Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada. She earned her BFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and her MFA from Alfred University. In 2021, she was awarded a McKnight Fellowship from the Northern Clay Center. Au is currently an Assistant Professor of Ceramics at the University of North Texas.

Mary Beth Magyar is a ceramic and community-engagement artist living and working in Rochester, Minnesota. Magyar is interested in making art more accessible to view and more accessible to show; smallärt is a mini gallery designed to do both.

Bryan Hopkins is a studio potter working in porcelain, and lives in Buffalo, New York. He was a mathematics major in college, and earned an MFA in Ceramics from SUNY at New Paltz. Bryan’s personal research in the field of ceramics centers on the vessel—both utilitarian and sculptural.

Shenny Cruces is the Associate Professor of Art and Ceramics at San Joaquin Delta College. She received a BA in Ceramics from Illinois State University and a Master of Fine Arts in Ceramics from San Francisco State University. Her current body of work explores gender and the collected object.

Malcolm Mobutu Smith is an associate professor of ceramics and director of graduate studies in the Eskenazi School of Art at Indiana University whose work can be found in numerous private and public collections including the Wexler Gallery, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, and Hunterdon Art Museum.

Tasha Reneé is a potter from Sacramento, California, who focuses on functional work. She has grown a small business around selling to local shops and some larger retailers, but has shifted her focus to learning more about the craft and selling directly to consumers. She loves working with raw work, and carved forms, but also enjoys playing with clay and movement.

Io Palmer was featured in several exhibitions including the Dakar Biennial, Senegal; Rush Gallery, New York City, and the Boise Art Museum. She received a Fulbright Grant to India in 2019. Io holds degrees from the University of Arizona, Tucson; and Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia. She is a professor at Washington State University.

SiouxBean works with clay to explore the relationships we have to cultural artifacts, ephemerality, visual culture, aesthetics, and the collective memory of the experiential. Grandson of a field worker, with roots in counter culture, the ceremonial smashing of his works goes against the craft culture of clay as a medium.

Valerie Zimany is Chair and Professor at Clemson University and member of the International Academy of Ceramics. She earned her MFA from Kanazawa College of Art as a Fulbright Fellow and Japanese Government Scholar. Her work resides in numerous public and private collections, and she exhibits nationally and internationally.

Tom Edwards works out of his home in Evergreen, Colorado. A full time potter since 1978, he produces a line of high-fire functional porcelain decorated with cartoon imagery. He considers his sense of humor to be the secret to his longevity in the field of ceramics.

Bio will be updated soon

I will discuss the cross-disciplinary projects undertaken by my studio and my collaborations with artists, mathematicians, designers, engineers, and dancers on various research projects, which involve graduate and undergraduate students from these disciplines. The studio thrives on collaboration, experimentation, and the diverse backgrounds and experiences of its participants.

Ehren Tool is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley. is a Marine Corps Veteran of the 1991 Gulf War. Tool has made and given away more than 23,000 cups since 2001. Tool earned his BFA at the University of Southern California in 2000, his MFA at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, in 2005. Tool is the Laboratory Mechanician in the Department of Art Practice at UC Berkeley.

Lauren Chipeur is an artist based in Calgary on Treaty 7 Territory. She makes material and site-responsive installations that engage ceramic processes as a way to untangle the complexity of the material world.

Soon following his birth in the town of Tutuaca, Chihuahua, Mexico, Juan Quezada relocated with his family in Mata Ortíz, at that time, a town only three blocks wide. Beginning in early childhood, he liked to work with his hands. Painting and sculpting with few available tools and resources, he experimented with wood, paper and even the walls of his house. As a teenager, he quit school to earn money and help his family. During trips to the mountains to collect firewood and maguey cactus as a teenager, he found and began to collect pre-Hispanic pots and shards from the Mimbres and Paquime’ (Casas Grandes) cultures in caves and other places. Inspired by these shards, Quezada initiated a quest of empirical rediscovery and reinvention. His painterly vessels juxtapose swooping, curvilinear designs with tight, geometrical patterns honoring and innovating on historical traditions. In 1999, Mexico awarded Juan Quezada the Premio Nacional de Ciencias y Artes – its highest creative honor.

Over the last 10 years, the Clay Fab Lab at NCECA has become an important forum for presenting the uses and applications of digital technologies in ceramics. As we continue to collectively excavate this emergent history we're also curious about the ways in which, enfolded within even the most technical presentation, is an activity of story-telling. Kari and Del will use this 90 minute Fab-Lab presentation to unravel, illustrate, illuminate, and fictionalize ideas of technology, the digital, primary source, and history in the contemporary ceramics field.

Kari Marboe takes on the role of an artist and detective flattening as many data points as possible around the history of people, objects, and experiences in order to create new narratives that intertwine with our present moment. She presents her work in the form of ceramic sculptures, clay printed onto watercolor paper, archival images, accidentally stolen keys, and other site-specific elements. Marboe earned a BFA from California College of the Arts in 2008 and MFA from UC Berkeley in 2012. She has exhibited work at the Saint Mary’s College Museum of Art, CA, Greenwich House Pottery, NY, Mills College Art Museum, CA, A-B Projects (Nicole Seisler), CA, 500 Capp Street/Southern Exposure, CA, Berkeley Art Center, CA, Museum of Craft and Design, CA, Wave Pool Gallery, OH, Museum of Northern California Art, CA, Jacksonville University, FL, and the Waffle Shop Billboard, PA. She has also participated in residencies at Greenwich House Pottery, NY, Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts, ME, Mutual Stores, CA, and Elsewhere Museum, NC. Marboe lives in the Bay Area and is an Assistant Professor at California College of the Arts.

Bryan Hopkins is a studio potter working in porcelain, and lives in Buffalo, New York. He was a mathematics major in college, and earned an MFA in Ceramics from SUNY at New Paltz. Bryan’s personal research in the field of ceramics centers on the vessel—both utilitarian and sculptural.

Josh DeWeese is a Ceramics Professor at Montana State University in Bozeman and is currently serving as Interim Director for the School of Art. He is the former Director of the Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, Montana. DeWeese has exhibited and taught internationally and his work is included in collections around the world.

Link Henderson is the owner of Kentucky Mudworks. KY Mudworks manufactures over 20 different clay bodies in house, produces our own line of glazes, and makes Dirty Girls pottery tools along with Groovy Tools. Over the years we've helped build a robust community of ceramic artists, enthusiasts, and businesses.

Takuro Shibata is a ceramic artist who lived and worked in Shigaraki, Japan, and now lives in Seagrove, North Carolina. He earned a Bachelor of Engineering Degree in Applied Chemistry from Doshisha University, Japan. He is a ceramic-material specialist and the director of STARworks Ceramics. He is a member of the International Academy of Ceramics.

Josh DeWeese is a Ceramics Professor at Montana State University in Bozeman and is currently serving as Interim Director for the School of Art. He is the former Director of the Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, Montana. DeWeese has exhibited and taught internationally and his work is included in collections around the world.

Link Henderson is the owner of Kentucky Mudworks. KY Mudworks manufactures over 20 different clay bodies in house, produces our own line of glazes, and makes Dirty Girls pottery tools along with Groovy Tools. Over the years we've helped build a robust community of ceramic artists, enthusiasts, and businesses.

Careen Stoll traveled globally and in the self. She learned pottery from Linda Christianson, John Neely, and Silvie Granatelli. There she grew the ethics of studio practice and ecological effect that informed construction of the innovative Tin Man kiln in Portland, Oregon. She now integrates permaculture and pottery practice on her land.

John Bauer is a South African ceramicist with work in two national museums, who shows internationally. Bauer is an inventor and material engineer who currently tiles buildings in kaleidoscopic matchbox tiles, each one unique. Bauer is inept at many things, however, his disasters are fertile ground for artworks forging new frontiers.

Asmaa Mohammed Ebraheem El-Essealy is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Art Education, and Faculty of Specific Education at the University of Tanta, Egypt. She is a member of Designers Syndicate–Ergonomic Design; and a member of the Intellectual Property Association of the Arab League Member of the Arab Society for Islamic Civilization and Arts.

Jen Allen is a studio potter, mother, and educator in Morgantown, West Virginia. She earned her BFA from the University of Alaska, Anchorage; and her MFA from Indiana University, Bloomington.

Virgil Ortiz is one of the most avant-garde artists of his time. With a career spanning four decades, Ortiz’s artistry extends across various media and boundaries—challenging societal expectations and breaking taboos. His vision fuses his Pueblo culture with sci-fi, fantasy, and apocalyptic themes, yielding imagery that is both provocative and futuristic. Ortiz’s works are exhibited in museum collections worldwide, including Fondation Cartier pour I’art Contemporain, Smithsonian Institution, Minneapolis Institute of Art, and Denver Art Museum.

Tara Carpenter Estrada is an associate professor of art education at Brigham Young University in Utah. As a practicing artist, she makes mixed-media and ceramic art that is shown in national and international juried exhibitions. Carpenter Estrada is also the director of BYU Jumpst(ART), a series of workshops for K–12 students.

Katie Seamons is a creative, thoughtful artist and teacher who values experiences over lectures and her people above everything else. She currently teaches Sculpture, Ceramics, and Painting at Lone Peak High School in Highland, Utah.

Rhett Russo is a designer, educator and a maker of ceramic objects. He currently serves as the Undergraduate Chair in Architecture at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). Russo defines his approach to Architecture and Design as Ceramicology – a confluence between the ceramic process, the physics and chemistry of clay, and technology.

Camila Friedman-Gerlicz is an artist and educator currently living and working in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She incorporates her love of math into her artistic work by making functional and sculptural work that explores mathematical concepts and objects.

Lisa Reinertson is known for both her life size figurative ceramic sculptures and her large-scale public sculptures cast in bronze. Coming from a family of peace and social activists, Reinertson’s work has an underlying humanism that can be seen both in her poetic and environmentally charged ceramic figures with animals, to her more historic public commissions that express ideals of peace and social justice. In her public sculptures of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Cesar Chavez she blends bas-relief into her three-dimensional sculptural forms creating an historic and powerfully moving narrative. Her work combines a realism rooted in figurative art traditions, with a contemporary expression of social and psychological content. Reinertson completed her MFA at UC Davis in 1984, studying with Robert Arneson, and Manuel Neri. She has taught at several universities and colleges in Northern California including CSU Chico, Santa Clara University, UC Berkeley and the San Francisco Art Institute. Her ceramic work has been in exhibitions and museums nationally and internationally, and is in several public and private collections including the Crocker Art Museum, the ASU Art Museum, the Mint Museum and the American Museum of Ceramic Art. Reinertson has completed over 20 public commissions in bronze.

Sienna Orlando-Lalaguna is the owner and maker behind Sienna Ceramics, and the founder of Strega Studios in Chico, California. She designs and creates a line of pottery for farm-to-table living and the appreciation of food, as well as sculpture inspired by the natural world, and a deep connection to plants.

Hideo Mabuchi teaches and conducts research as a Professor of Applied Physics at Stanford University. In the studio he focuses on thrown-and-altered vessel forms for atmospheric firings. He is working on new teaching approaches that integrate ceramics with scientific and humanistic studies to bring craft into the core of liberal undergraduate education.

Raised in Flagstaff, Arizona, Matt Levy grew up with a passion for rocks that culminated in a lifelong appreciation for clay and glazes. He earned his BFA from the University of Wisconsin, River Falls (UWRF) and his MFA from Montana State University in Bozeman, with a focus in sourcing local materials. He is formerly the Assistant Director of STARworks Ceramics, North Carolina.

Takuro Shibata is a ceramic artist who lived and worked in Shigaraki, Japan, and now lives in Seagrove, North Carolina. He earned a Bachelor of Engineering Degree in Applied Chemistry from Doshisha University, Japan. He is a ceramic-material specialist and the director of STARworks Ceramics. He is a member of the International Academy of Ceramics.

Hitomi Shibata is a Japanese artist who focuses on wood-fired ceramics, and makes functional and sculptural ceramics in Seagrove, North Carolina. She holds a BEd in Ceramic Art and an MEd in Fine Arts, Ceramics from Okayama University, Japan. She received a Rotary Scholarship and studied at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth. She is a member of the International Academy of Ceramics.

Josh DeWeese is a Ceramics Professor at Montana State University in Bozeman and is currently serving as Interim Director for the School of Art. He is the former Director of the Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, Montana. DeWeese has exhibited and taught internationally and his work is included in collections around the world.

Richard Burkett taught ceramics at San Diego State University (SDSU), including clay and glaze technology, for 30 years. He created HyperGlaze software for ceramics in 1988, and the first major internet database of glazes in the 1990s. He is the co-author of Mythical Figures & Mucawas, Ceramics: A Potter’s Handbook, and Porcelain Masters.

A passionate educator, writer, and researcher as well as a maker, gwendolyn yoppolo is currently serving as Associate Professor of Ceramics at Kutztown University. She has earned an MFA in Ceramics from Pennsylvania State University, an MA in Education from Columbia University, and a BA in Sociology from Haverford College. Her current areas of raw materials research investigates phase separation in Cone 6 glazes as well as colored porcelain clay bodies.

Alisa Liskin Clausen has been living in Denmark since the late 1990s. Her focus is on Cone 6 oxidation glazes, free sharing of information, and dedication to onward research.

Cory Brown is a ceramic artist and an Industrial Designer of Glazes for AMACO. He lives and works in Alfred, New York.

Steve Hilton is an artist and professor currently teaching at MSU Texas in Wichita Falls, TX. He earned his MFA in Ceramics from ASU, an MS in Art Education, and a BS in Geology from Missouri State University. Presently most of his work is unfired and installation-based. Hilton is a Fellow of the Council of NCECA.

Brian Harper is an Associate Professor of Fine Art at Indiana University Southeast and the Founder and Executive Director of Artaxis. He holds a BFA from Northern Arizona University and an MA and MFA from the University of Iowa. His work has been exhibited in more than 100 national and international exhibitions.

Alex Reed earned his BFA from Alfred University. Alex’s work spans independent studio projects and design for industry, including Rookwood Pottery and Heath Ceramics. Alex’s work has been exhibited at the MAK Center, The Craft Contemporary, The Future Perfect, AMOCA, The Neutra VDL House, and Marta.

Danielle Ruggiero is a ceramic artist and teacher working in Massachusetts. She earned her MS in Art Education in 2017, and her BFA from Syracuse University in Sculpture and Art Education in 2014. She has taught K–12 Art at several public schools for the past eight years.

Michelle Ettrick was a non-English speaking 13-year old when she arrived in the United States in 1982. Life in Brooklyn, New York, was a stark contrast to her early memories of Panama and the simple joys of climbing trees and playing with my friends while her mom was nearby hanging clothes on the line. “As an Afro-Latina, I struggled to find a community that would accept me and where I felt I belonged. I love being a maker and clay is my medium of choice. Clay is very personal material to me. When I put my hands in the clay, and my fingers get lost in the mixture, for the moment, we become one. I stretch, pull, pinch and form shapes where I leave evidence of my having been there. I follow up by drawing on my work, embracing my natural curly hair, heritage, womanhood, and at times current worldly struggles. My artwork is a record of my experiences as an Afro-Latina American.”

Born and raised in the border city of El Paso, Texas, George Rodriguez creates humorous decorative ceramic sculpture, addressing his identity and community. He earned a BFA from the University of Texas El Paso and an MFA from the University of Washington. Rodriguez is represented by Foster/White Gallery in Seattle.

Stacy Jo Scott is an artist and educator based in Eugene, Oregon. She uses ceramic processes as material anchors from which to navigate shifting landscapes of culture, identity, and embodiment through digital processes, trance practices, chance operations, and research. She is an Assistant Professor at the University of Oregon.

Gina Brownstein is a ceramic artist and educator who has taught in the Los Angeles County public school system for 22 years. She holds a BA in Studio Art from Scripps College, Teaching Credential in Art from CSU Los Angeles, CTE Credential in Ceramics, and an MA in Multicultural Education from National University.

Natalia Arbelaez is a Colombian American artist, born and raised in Miami, Florida, to immigrant parents. She earned her BFA from Florida International University and her MFA from Ohio State University. Her work has been exhibited internationally, in museums, galleries, and included in various collections, such as the Everson Museum in Syracuse, New York; and the Museum of Art and Design, New York.

Ysabel Alma Gray has been teaching ceramics for six years at a low-income highschool in California. In 2010 she completed her BFA in Ceramics from California State Long Beach, a Single Subject Art Credential in 2015, and an MA in Art Education in 2021 from Eastern Illinois University.

Ashley Rowley earned her BA in Studio Arts, emphasizing in Sculpture, from Azusa Pacific University, California, in 2015. She went on to teach visual arts in a K–12 classroom setting for four years before taking the job as the Education Manager at the American Museum of Ceramic Arts in 2018.

Danielle O’Malley is a sculptor in Helena, Montana. She earned her MFA from University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, and her BFA from Plymouth State University. She has attended residencies at: the Red Lodge Clay Center, the Paris Gibson Square, and Watershed. Her work is in permanent collections at the Northwest Art Gallery (North Dakota) and the Taoxichuan Art Center (Jingdezhen, China).

Lillian Barongo Ayieng’a is a PhD Design Candidate at Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute, China. Before then she was an adjunct lecturer in design at Multimedia University of Kenya. Her research is focused on development of new material technology for product design in Kenya, previously researching on glaze formulations using geological materials.

Ai Hong Wang is a Professor in Design at Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute, School of Art and Design in China. She has broad experience in design and has published widely in design-related subjects. Her publications include The High Computer Technology Application Study about the Daily-use Ceramic Products Design (2014).

Anna Calluori Holcombe is professor emerita in Ceramics at the School of Art and Art History at the University of Florida. Calluori Holcombe has vast international experience in ceramic art, education, and research in various capacities, alongside a number of publications.

Saila Milja-Smyly raw-glazes and single-fires all of her functional and sculptural work for her Earthenly LLC stoneware ceramics brand. Her formal training in anthropology and law facilitates a rigorous research and design process, deferring to source materials while contrasting her Nordic heritage with coastal South Carolina living.

Bryan Cera is an artist, designer and maker whose practice investigates information and data’s reciprocal relationships to matter and ideas. His studio explorations traverse creative coding, computational design, kinetic sculpture, and experimental platforms for digital fabrication. In 2016, he founded the Thing Tank - a laboratory dedicated to tinkering, rapid prototyping and research in object design and digital fabrication. He currently serves as Assistant Professor of Object Making and Emergent Technologies at the Alberta University of the Arts.

Dwayne Sackey earned his BFA from Oregon College of Art and Craft in 2019. Merit-based scholarships supported him: Gregori Jakovina & Larry McDonald Scholarship, Ellice T. Johnston Scholarship, and OCAC Community College Scholarship. In 2019, Sackey showed at the Multnomah County Justice Center, and in 2021 he showed at the governor’s mansion. Sackey received the 2021 Studio Potter Grant for Apprenticeship, apprenticing under Chris Baskin.

Risa Hricovsky is an Assistant Professor of Art at Lincoln Memorial University. In her work, she pushes boundaries of materiality and between art, design, and craft. Hricovsky earned an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) and has exhibited nationally and internationally. Select residencies include: The Studios at MASS MoCA, Guldagergaard in Denmark, and SIM in Iceland

Russell Wrankle is an Associate Professor of Art at Southern Utah University in Cedar City, Utah. He is the founder of Shape Theory Collective, an online gallery that supports the Last Prisoner Project whose purpose is to free the 40,000 cannabis prisoners from the for-profit Prison Industrial Complex.

Evelyn LaChapelle is an experienced events coordinator and community liaison, who is now utilizing her professional position within the legal cannabis industry to advocate for restorative justice. She is a program associate at Last Prisoner Project, dedicated to redressing the past and continuing harms caused by the war on cannabis.

Artist, cultural and academic leader, Sanjit Sethi is currently the President of the Minneapolis College of Art and Design with prior leadership roles including the Corcoran School of the Arts and Design at George Washington University, Memphis College of Art, the California College of the Arts, and the Santa Fe Art Institute.