About my work

Making pots is simultaneously one of the most rewarding and frustrating use of that old idea factory rattling around between my ears. In periods of my life where I haven't been active in a studio, my notebooks tend to get inundated with sketches and daydreams for when our love is reunited. When we do get back together again, some ideas need to remain just ideas (for lots of reasons).

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Like most potters, I Iike a bit of chaos, while working within the confines of the medium. Clay has hard and fast rules. There is an element of danger that cannot be denied. Yet clay has reassuring and flexible qualities. Best of all, it gathers creative people to commune in shared rituals: making, firing, cooking, eating.

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In my education and exploration into form, decoration, and technique, I have experimented aplenty. I plan to continue to do so. As time has gone on, this experimentation has become more focused, converging on central ideas and repeated variations:

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• Use - One of the loveliest aspects of clay is that it begs for the user's involvement, to touch, use, explore, flip over, cradle, wash, and sometimes--and hopefully not for a long time--break. There is an intimate bridge traveled between the user and creator when we interact with clay works. A pot's form and function often asks its next owner to hold and consider the piece in similar ways that the maker held and considered it when creating it.

• Home - I was raised in Alaska, on Iñupiaq land in Sitŋasuaq (Nome). While Alaska isn't my generational home, my personal living memory is filled with images essential to the place: Lichen-crusted shale; bundles of fireweed becoming translucent pink jelly; purple stained fingertips; steaming loaves of bread; tiny, stubborn bushes. I reference these motifs in the forms, textures and surfaces of my pots. I also associate "home" with feelings of comfort and nourishment.

• Delight - The idea that this emotion, contagious as a baby's laugh, can be evoked by or serve as a reminder through clay is my essential motivation in making. Not only noticing my own delight, but drinking in the moments in time when I can feel it from others.

About me

I began my relationship with clay over 10 years ago while at Gonzaga University in Spokane, WA. After moving to Homer, I was mentored by Ruby Haigh at the Jars of Clay Studio for nearly six years. In exchange for studio space, I helped with many aspects of running a studio--from mixing glazes, to inventory and ordering, to online commerce and craft fairs. When Jars of Clay closed in 2021, I was invited to a similar arrangement at Paul Dungan's studio. Ruby and Paul have been fantastic teachers and mentors to me, and I have tried my best to repay this generosity with hard work and reliability.