As a fifth generation Coloradan my work reflects the culture that I was raised in. Simplicity, utility, beauty and modest price are my guidelines, and my primary inspiration is traditional pottery from all cultures. Rather than making ware for the contemporary art market, I try to fill the niche that potters have occupied historically; making useful things for average people. I use a wide variety of glazes and my work ranges from teacups to burial urns. Most of my functional work is stoneware, while my decorative pieces are raku or sagger fired. My display ware is form oriented, with a feeling of mass rather than profile being predominant. Surface treatment is used to emphasize form and to add interest to it.
Pottery making for me began in 1969 at East Denver High School when I signed up for sculpture but was given ceramics instead. It didn’t take long to realize that there was something that I ‘got’ about pottery that had eluded me in other media. I took classes around the Denver area and made pots on a part time basis until 1976 when I started to attend LorettoHeights College under James and Nan McKinnell. James started making pottery only after receiving a M.S. in Ceramic Engineering, and provided all of his students with an invaluable foundation of technical knowledge. After receiving my BA in Ceramic Art I apprenticed under Dave Blakeslee in Lafayette, Co.
In 1981 my wife Sue and I bought a house in Brighton, Co. and built a studio and kiln in the rear where I made useful stoneware until 1990. We then bought the Two Potters gallery and studio in downtown Littleton where we sold all of my production as well as work by several local potters. My wife Sue and I ran Two Potters together until 2001, when we bought the Woodland Inn, a B&B in Woodland Park. From then until the spring of 2005, when we closed our retail store, I was responsible for all but the bookwork at Two Potters. About 1998 I started making raku again for the first time since college, and have been exploring this technique as a sideline since then.
My early influences were oriental, but as time wore on English and Middle Eastern pottery interested me as well. Contemporary potters that have been important to me include Michael Cardew and Harry and Mae Davis. Their no nonsense forms and their commitment to making quality ware at affordable prices were guideposts that I still rely on when designing and making useful pottery.
I consider my functional ware to be quite different in concept than the raku that I make. With these pots I try to stay in the century’s old tradition of making simple, useful pieces that people of average means can afford. I feel that this is an art form of great depth and value, and I find that as I make functional ware I frequently think of the future user. The raku that I make is more overtly creative as there is less consideration for either function or moderate price, and in my production process I am only concerned with playing with forms that interest me and finding interesting things to do with the surface that emphasize the form. These two creative approaches balance each other and have provided me with a complete creative experience.
After closing Two Potters in 2005, I managed the ceramics studio at the Business of Art Center in Manitou Springs for a couple of years, and presently have a studio at our Bed and Breakfast in Woodland Park. While still concentrating of useful ware, I have been experimenting with both low temperature ‘sagger’ firing, and have also recently started working with a high temperature wood fired kiln, which produces unique surfaces on clay. I have also done a couple of series of wall pieces with my daughter Audrey, combining ceramic elements with earth materials such as mica and sand.
