SUMMARY

I am passionate about the natural world and the intersections it affords between science and art. Responding to nature informs every aspect of my creative process. Primarily a ceramicist with four years of experience, I also have visual arts training in design, drawing, painting, and sculpture.

When making pottery I strive to craft a piece that balances comfort and functionality. To do this, I work off touch more than sight and focus on how my hands occupy the outer shape of an emergent vessel. While specific plans for a piece are made before throwing, the exact dimensions of a vessel are improvised on the wheel depending on what feels best to hold.

After trimming and bisque firing, experimentation with glaze is another key aspect of my process. The color shift from glaze firing makes it difficult to predict the finished outcome of a piece. That variation is the fun of glazing, but creating the best pattern and combination requires work. While slabs are useful for testing color combinations and textures, they don’t inform how a glaze will move, thinning on a sharp lip or settling in a glassy pool, so I often use imperfect pieces as 3D tests. The final vessel should be complex enough to draw the eye, but straightforward enough to be comfortable and intuitive to use.

SKILLS

Pottery, Sculpture, Critical thinking, Patience, Self-direction

EDUCATION

Ethical Culture Fieldston School / September 2007-May 2021

Rhode Island School of Design|CE / Summers 2017 & 2018, February 2020

  • 3D Design Teen Certificate

  • 2D Design Teen Certificate

  • Art School Preparation Teen Certificate

EXPERIENCE

Ceramics Student
Fieldston School, Bronx, NY / 2017-2021

  • Learn building techniques such as pinching and coiling, wheel throwing, handled vessels, combination wheel and hand built vessels.

  • Experiment with texture and shape refinement such as trimming, colored slip, and surface carving.

  • Create bowls, cups, teapots, lidded jars, plates, vases, statues from white clay.

  • Apply various glaze techniques: underglaze inlay, brush application, dipping, pouring, multi-glaze application, wax/tape resist; fire at cone 6 with lead-free glazes.

Painting and Drawing Student
Fieldston School, Bronx, NY / 2020-2021

  • Explore composition, value & space, color, and paint application techniques as well as abstract and representational approaches to produce 2D works.

  • Current lessons and projects include blind contour drawings of classmates in pencil, value and space study of my window in pencil, still life drawings using vine and compressed charcoal, and still life acrylic paintings using complementary colors.

Ceramics Student, Studio Member
La Mano Pottery, New York, NY / 2017-2018, November 2020-Present

  • Improve skills on potter’s wheel by throwing and trimming iron flecked red clay jars, teapots, vases, and bowls.

  • Broaden experience in dipping, pouring, and layering glazes; fired at cone 05 and cone 5.

Teen Artist
RISD Continuing Education, Providence, RI / Summers 2017 & 2018, February 2020
Obtained significant artistic experience that expanded my horizons beyond 3D materials; though I am partial to creating 3D forms, I gained a greater understanding of the expressive capabilities of 2D materials.

  • Carving Soapstone / July 24-28, 2017 - Learned basic carving techniques, perused RISD’s picture library for visual reference to sculpt a small soapstone rabbit.

  • Ceramic Sculpture / July 24-August 4, 2017 - Created clay bowls, planters, and a multi-footed pot using slab work, coiling, colored slip, wax/tape overlay.

  • Heroes in Space / July 31-August 4, 2017 - Learned about sculptural anatomy, proportion, character design. Built a humanoid robot using polymer clay over a metal armature.

  • Drawing Urban Landscapes / July 2-3, 2018 - Learned the basics of perspective creating one, two, and three-point perspective drawings, studied atmospheric and uphill/downhill perspectives, sketched Providence street views with an array of buildings and architectural styles using pencil and charcoal.

  • Painting the Scenic Landscape / July 5-6, 2018 - Open-air painting class at RISD Tillinghast Place, sketches and paintings employed light and value of natural environment. Improved skills in color mixing and techniques (wet on wet) for acrylic and watercolor paintings of farm animals, landscape and seascape.

  • Figure Drawing / July 9-13, 2018 - Working with live models, learned about composition and proportion techniques necessary to interpret human form and anatomy. Practiced gesture drawing, strengthened observational drawing skills.

  • Experiments with Color / July 9-13, 2018 - Performed color studies to identify value and tone through still-life drawings using different mediums: charcoal, monochromatic oil pastel, and three oil pastel colors. Visited RISD Nature Lab and explored Providence to create a textile landscape of nature in the city with warm and cool colors.

  • Landscape Design / July 16-20, 2018 - Developed a scaled base plan for a community garden using math, site analysis, architectural principles. Presented design concept and plan to peers.

  • Architectural Design / July 16-20,2018 - Utilized critical thinking skills, math, architectural processes and spatial aesthetics to design a scaled base plan for a 1 1⁄2 story community art cafe meant to contain a changing venue of artwork.

  • The Painted Portrait / July 23-27, 2018 - Created portraits that demonstrated use of the grid method, basic color theory, visual articulation of emotion, lighting principles. Produced a self-portrait based on a color photograph.

  • Sculpting Paper + Flower Forms / July 23-27, 2018 - Built large flower forms out of a variety of papers, visited RISD Nature Lab to reference dried seed pods to create paper lanterns.

  • Carving Soapstone Amulets / February 17, 2020 - Studied brief history of amulets and talismans, transferred 3D concepts to physical forms, carved stone into miniature items of personal iconography (acorn, bear, cat, and obelisk) using rasps, controlled cut methods, and finishing sandpaper techniques.

Student
Gather Glass, Providence, RI / August 1, 2017

  • Learned about the art and craft of glassblowing, including frit dipping technique, to make a multicolored drinking glass.

Student
Children’s Museum of the Arts, New York, NY / Summer 2017

  • Design for Stop Motion Animation / July 10-14, 2017 - Created animated short (The Beach) about ocean pollution, built 2D and 3D objects, developed skills in character design, storyboarding, photographic composition, sound design, and iStopMotion techniques.