Steven Summerville

I personally design and create all of my earthenware, using colored under glazes and a liquid clay decoration known as slip trailing to suggest vitality and movement. After I throw the pots and different elements on a kick wheel, I apply the under glaze, and skip trail each piece separately. If a piece is part of my “dancing series,” I then model its legs and/or knobs and handles, and add them to complete the piece. The pots are allowed to dry, bisque fired to 200 degrees, covered with a clear glaze, and then fired again to 1800 degrees.

I have been in love with clay since I was 10 years old, and became a production potter in 1976. During the past 9 years, I have aggressively explored color, form and the limits of my imagination. My designs have evolved from abstractions and bits of pattern I have seen and loved, including wallpaper patterns and others that I have seen in nature. Some of these are incorporated in to my “dancing series,” which features functional pots with 3 or 4 legs fashioned to imply motion.

As I develop artistically, my goal is to find new ways to expand my vocabulary of functional design and beauty.