In the past five years more work has changed a lot. I've gone from a sort of cute aesthetic where I focused on things that were fun like cupcakes and strawberries. (I still think they're fun) Lately I've transitioned into a hand-drawn and stamped aesthetic mostly focusing on local flora. And now most recently, I have added deer. There seems to be a growing trend amongst potters these days (Ayumi Horie, Ron Philbeck, Bernadette Curran, and many more!) As my work has evolved through a move far north, pregnancy, and now a working mom with a home studio I have always strived to stay true to myself. So I never thought that I would look to animals to create my hand-drawn patterns.
I guess maybe it started with insects? The inspiration for these drawings came from a walk I took near my house. It was cold, but I was determined to get some exercise somehow! There is a lovely trail near our house so here I was huffing and puffing away when a row of deer stopped in their tracks and all their ears were right in a row. They looked so elegant and stunning in the field with the dead plants under the frost.
I made these pieces before I really knew why. The image of the deer is still sort of burned in my mind. I thought about it a lot, why deer? Is it just trendy? It started to make sense for me on our road trip. I thought about deer, they're everywhere where we live. Some people hate them, some people hit them with their cars, some hunt them for trophies and meat.
But in the dusk or early morning they are still stunning enough to stop and stare.
My work is meant for daily use. It's durable. You can put it in the dishwasher, my son drinks out of my cups. It's a far cry from the deliberately elegant work I made when I was young.
But it's still beautiful enough to stop and notice.
Like the deer.
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