I am a ceramic artist living and working in Madison, WI. Twelve years ago I started taking an evening pottery class at a local community center. I was hooked! After spending several years taking workshops and classes I was amassing a huge amount of bowls and mugs, so I decided to start my own business selling my work.

Many nights and weekends in community studio spaces over the years have led to my own studio space in my home where I now work full-time making pottery.

Life in the studio is not very glamorous. There is almost always clay under my fingernails. I own more t-shirts than dresses. Coffee, sugar, and 80s music, i.e. Duran Duran and Depeche Mode fuel my days.

I enjoy carefully crafting each piece of clay, one at a time, experimenting with different textures, colors, and surface decorations to create a unique line of pottery for your everyday life.

(Hands photo by Paul West.)

My journey actually began with a terribly impulsive decision. While waiting tables, an extremely rude customer prompted me to spontaneously quit my waitress job. In a moment of pure desperation, I decided to start selling my jewelry.

As I fell more and more in love with the process of making, a whole new path was born. I dropped out of graduate school and signed up for a metals class. I was hooked. Like, obsessively, starry eyed hooked. I found myself fascinated by the ancient techniques of metalsmithing, connecting me to a lineage of metalsmiths who have gone before me. My fascination with stones, color and ancient designs only grew stronger.

From there, I went on to achieve a degree as a goldsmith, giving me the skills needed to make all the beautiful things floating around in my head.

Ponder refracted light through glass created by Carol Giffin. Kiln formed vessels hold pensive thoughts that reflect our daily lives. On the surface the play of light mirrors our world, yet, just beneath the surface a new world emerges. Layers of glass create illusions of depth drawing you to peer deeper into the vessels. Design elements lead your eye through angles and curves that transforms these pieces into a one of a kind masterpiece.

Formally trained in Art Education, Carol regularly teaches stained glass and glass fusing classes in Madison, Wisconsin. Throughout the year, Carol can be found teaching as a guest artist at various national venues. Her ‘how to’ articles have been published in Glass Patterns Quarterly Magazine since 2006. When not melting glass in her studio you can find her enjoying the breeze on her motorcycle.

Lisa is fortunate to have been raised by parents who fostered every creative impulse she ever had; consequently, she enjoys painting, sewing, cooking, collage, writing bad haiku and singing worse karaoke. It was clay, however, that completely stole her heart and hands.

While in college at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Lisa studied both fine arts and Spanish language. She traveled throughout Mexico which greatly influenced her ceramic work at the time. She produced sculptural, “barely functional” coiled and pinched vessels that evoked her fascination with early Mesoamerican pottery and sculpture.  

Ceramics would take a backseat to linguistic and educational pursuits for nearly 8 years. After earning a master’s degree in Applied Linguistic followed by a K-8 teacher’s license, Lisa took a job that she loves teaching reading and math to 4th- and 5th-graders at Sandburg Elementary School.

Clay worked its way back into Lisa’s heart in 2012 when she took a night class at a Madison School Community Recreation Center, and then wondered why she’d ever stopped playing in the mud. She currently (and happily) leads a dual life: teacher by day, artist by night. It's a pretty good gig.

While a good deal of my current work is thrown on a potter’s wheel, my first love is hand-building. There is just something irresistible to me about the impression left on clay—whether intentional or incidental—that evokes a feeling of pliability and plasticity, long after the piece has been fired to a hard and durable state.  

Slabs are the starting place for most of my current work. I nearly always stamp my slabs with bisqued stamps I’ve created myself, and then use those decorated slabs to charge one- and two-piece plaster molds. All work is high-fired stoneware. Stains, latex-resist and commercial decals add variety. While most of the work is functional, visual and tactile appeal are essential; it has to “feel right.”

The Metalest Works Sculptures are welded creations, utilizing re-purposed steel materials. Each piece is hand crafted to the re-create the unique vision from the artists' perspective.

From early on in life, I have always been building in some fashion or another. From construction sets, to professional landscaping of rock wall installations. Among many creative hobbies, I have found my niche in taking an everyday item and seeing its potential in the sculpting process.

I create, whimsical creatures of wild and domestic descent. Flowers, birds, dragons and steam punk characters are a few, in my diverse collection. Sculptures range from six inches to sixteen feet in height and length. All are my original pieces, for shelf and garden display.

As an artist, I am a hobbyist at heart, by which my work cannot be determined from my play.

I grew up on the shores of Lake Erie. This lake has always been part of my life. I count on it for recreation and it is part of my life therapy.

Seventeen years ago I made myself some jewelry from my collection of beach glass. People requested that I make more, which I did. Suddenly, I was making jewelry for a living!

My designs are made with genuine beach glass found by me on the shores of Lake Erie. I do not alter or change the glass in any way. Each design includes a hand picked piece of glass which is just the way mother nature created it!

Maia graduated from Tufts University in 2008 with a degree in Biology and Community Health.  After two years in the field of kidney research in Boston, Massachusetts, she quit her job and moved to Gatlinburg, TN to participate in the work-study program at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts.  She continued her education at Pocosin Arts in Columbia, NC and opened a gallery there.  She was a studio artist and instructor in Chicago, completed her Masters in Fine Art at SUNY New Paltz and was selected as an artist in residence at Arrowmont School for Arts and Crafts for the 2016/2017 session.

Her work has been shown internationally at Schmuck in Munich Germany and Galerie Marzee in Nijmegen, Netherlands and most recently at the Baltimore Jewelry Center, Velvet da Vinci, Taboo Studio, and the McColl Center for Art and Innovation.

Artist Statement

My process is dictated by the limits that I place on myself: the source of inspiration, my process of design and creating, my use of materials, colors and mechanisms.  My work is also drawn from the need to create volume out of flatness.  By using almost exclusively steel sheet, I aim to manipulate the material to have a dimension it did not previously have.  The forms are inspired by botanical elements, abstracted and simplified to their most basic shape. I design much of my work on a 3-D rendering computer program called Rhinoceros, and then I either send my work to be laser-cut, or I cut it myself. I use silicone cord, steel tubing, and wire to create the finished piece of work.  I restrict my color choices to the black, white, and the terracotta color of the industrial silicone. I am interested in scale, volume, movement and repetition and how the computer can help me explore these ideas.

The resulting work is an exploration of the intersection between the botanical and the industrial. Having the work be wearable is a primary goal, but I also want to push that idea and play on the balance between overwhelming and attracting the viewer.  I do not want the wearer to look at the jewelry and immediately see a specific plant or flower, but to get the feeling that one gets when seeing or being surrounded by botanicals. 

With my photography, I like to see things in a different way, whether it is a macro view or a distant view. 

Coloring photos by hand allows me to reinterpret an image in a way that color film cannot.  It allows me to communicate a feeling as well as a sense of nostalgia.  When I hand color a photograph, I can change the world, if only for moment.

Each image begins with a black and white photograph or a digital painting printed in color. The image is hand colored using a variety of mediums.

I was inspired to hand paint my photos by a hand-painted black and white photograph of an English garden by Wallace Nutting. It was a wedding gift for my grandparents as in the early 1920s. This image, my inspiration, now hangs in my home.

I hope you like my view of the world.

Annie Pennington is an award-winning independent jewelry designer, video artist, instructor, and freelance writer with over 14 years of experience in the jewelry field. She maintains a personal workshop and storefront, and was the Associate Editor of Art Jewelry magazine (a hobbyist publication offering how-to and technical articles in the field of jewelry and metalsmithing) for more than four years. Pennington received her BFA in Jewelry Design from Pittsburg State University and her MFA in Metalsmithing from Southern Illinois University­ Edwardsville. Her jewelry has been published in numerous books and periodicals, and she has an extensive exhibition record, both nationally and internationally.

Leslie began her artistic career by studying theatre, which detoured into a study of nursing, during which she became interested in the visual arts. 

This led her to complete a degree in art while working full time as an RN. It was during this time that she was first introduced to metals and jewelry, which subsequently knocked her socks off and quickly became her media of choice, and love of her life.

Feeling called to create, teach and inspire others on a more full time basis, she retired from nursing in 1995 to pursue graduate studies, returning to Chicago in 1997 as a full time artist and teacher while completing a Masters degree in Metals and jewelry from the Savanna College of Art and Design.

Nicky Ross is the dirt drenched potter behind Nstarstudio.  Working out of her Madison studio, she throws, decorates and glazes every piece one at a time, with care, consideration and oodles of love.  She designs all her work with a strong sense of tradition, a dash of whimsy and a lasting personal imprint.

Forever swooned by the beautiful nuance of handmade objects, she strives to combine her love of function with her wide appreciation of color to create fresh and fun everyday objects. 

Nstarstudio is her labor of love, for clay, for craft and all the scrumptious colors.

Wanderlust and Adventure Jeweler based on travel inspirations.
  
Working with my hands has always been a part of my life. Since I could move I have been collecting skills and creating things. Minnesota, with its extensive art community, has very much influenced my work. “Lake life” and Native American Culture along with places I travel have been working their way into my pieces. I create jewelry that I like to wear first and foremost and then I share them. My recent focus is making pieces that invoke a story I want to tell or maybe a message I’d like to convey to you. Each piece is a chapter of that story. There is always an ongoing list of creations being planned on paper and in my thoughts. 

I am ever grateful to be an art warrior and a student of life and travel. Family and working with my hands are the two most important parts of my existence. 

I currently reside in Excelsior, MN. 

I have loved drawing and creating 3-dimensional objects since a very early age. The “art” I created began with pencil sketching, watercolor and charcoal pictures of people and landscapes. In college, I continued taking art classes, but chose to major in Pediatric Occupational Therapy. I used many “forms of art” therapeutically in my treatment plans.  I continued to explore other mediums: glass (glass bead making, stained glass, fusing), but focused on metals in 2005.

I primarily work on hand-fabricated metal smithing techniques like forging: stretching, molding, shaping and texturing fine silver and sterling with hammers, drill bits, rolling mill. This creates a minimalistic style and organic feel in the jewelry. I pair it with multi setting techniques: bezel, tab set, tapered bezel, prong setting; capturing gemstones and cabochons that enhance the jewelry.

Working with her dog at her side in her home studio in Fitchburg, Wisconsin, Julie forges silver and niobium metals using traditional metalsmith techniques. The result is unique artisan jewelry with an emphasis on clean lines and quality craftsmanship. Fine silver wire and sterling silver sheet metal is sawn, soldered and forged to create distinctive hammered silver pieces which reveal the “makers marks” of the hammering. Colorful niobium metal is transformed by the application of an electric current which creates an amazing opalescent color palette. Niobium metal is completely hypoallergenic and extremely lightweight which makes it perfect for those with sensitivities to other metals.

“It’s satisfying when each handcrafted piece of jewelry finds its way to its owner.”

For the most part my artwork is pretty straightforward and should not require much explanation, it is visually literal. The determination for what I create is very subject matter driven and generally found within the confines of the urban and rural landscape of Wisconsin. This is my home, I like it a lot and the catalog of potential paintings and drawings is infinite.

Maybe there is some emotional motivation, a touch of humor or something significant enough to make it worth investing the time to capture, as art. Of course, within this decision making equation are composition, color and contrast, along with approach/technique/medium in determining how to execute each endeavor.

In the end it is quite simple. The process should be both, challenging and satisfying for me. I would also hope that the viewer enjoys what they see and does not tire of looking at the artwork.

Now a current Chicago resident, Caroline Walser studied Drawing and Painting at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee where she received a Bachelor’s in Fine Arts. Much of her work is strongly influenced by the city environments she experiences while traveling. She is especially intrigued by the architectural compositions she finds, along with the aesthetics of the local trains and transportation. Having moved to Chicago late last year, she looks forward to continuing to explore the city and its art community.  

Artist Statement

For the past couple of years, I have enjoyed exploring different ways to portray the cities I’ve explored both in the US and abroad. I’m fascinated by the various compositions found in a city due to all the shapes and lines created by its infrastructure. I am also very interested in playing with color theory to experiment with how different colored grounds influence and interact with the colors found in the subject matter to create a different type of atmosphere in each painting.

I create jewelry inspired by clean simple industrial design with a twist of vintage.  Eclectic pieces using color and texture to create unique jewelry with a variety of materials including kiln formed glass, natural gemstones, vintage & found objects and enameled & hand forged metals.

Hannah Wong of HRS Designs creates work that is intended to be interactive with its wearer, whether a physical or an intellectual interaction. Its wearer will take part in a challenge of how art and the body collide. Hannah seeks to create a new value for found objects, making the “valueless” valuable. She also strives to make the unnoticed noticed, and to strip objects of their intended function and meaning. In my work, there is commonly a play on words and a sense of reality displacement. Some of her work maybe described is colorful, fun, and its form is best described as soft geometry. 

Artist Statement

My jewelry is inspired by forms found in nature, as well as architecture and topographical maps. I am attracted to clean lines, geometric forms and intricate patterns. I attempt to harvest my inspirations and apply meaning to my work by designing with a purpose.  My desire is to create work that challenges traditional conceptions of beauty and social conventions. 

As a trained metalsmith, I work primarily in sterling silver and 14k gold. I design modern jewelry with details of Mokume Gane,  Keum boo, traditional stone setting and crushed gemstones. Copper and bronze are used when I make Mokume gane, a metalsmithing technique derived from an ancient Japanese sword making process of layering metals. My art process involves experimenting with texturizing, soldering, and oxidizing metal. I challenge conventional gemstone setting by crushing and reconstructing them in my pieces. I also seek out unique gemstones that I can compliment with metal forms that accentuate the natural details of the stones.

My end goal is to create modern and sophisticated jewelry that results in a statement piece for the wearer.

Hi! I'm Pamm of Bots & Co. You might be wondering why I started making bots. Well, it was out of necessity. I really wanted to purchase one, but they were out of my price range. If I was going to have one, I would need to make it myself. One led to more and a business was born.

I search antique malls, flea markets and vintage sales for interesting junk to create my bots. They are not toys but are just-for-fun display pieces. Each one is unique and has its own personality. I hope they make you smile!

Jen owns Twinkle Toes and Flirty Girl Adornments and Treasures. She specializes in sweet, handmade, one-of-a-kind adornments: pendants/necklaces, earrings, bracelets, and more fashioned from vintage destash, salvage hardware, gemstones, agates, and more.  Free spirited, shabby, chic, unique, one-of-a-kind pieces!

She also dabbles in handmade bath and body feel goods (bath salts in vintage containers are part of the Flirty Girl Feel Goods line).

Why not add a little “Twinkle” to your life?!