These works are part of a larger series in different media that represent an exploration of time and memory. The ceramic work relates to landscape and the earth, inspired by trips through the Mojave Desert.  I see these works as containers of memory filled with the resonance of time, beauty, change and loss.

Inspiration, Please, Inspiration humorously explores the transcendent creative process.  Praying hands symbolize respect for the ineffable creative experience or perhaps are an expression of desperation. Harvesting some of the inspirational quotes I keep around my studio, I used yellow text to play off Kandinsky’s characterization of yellow: “Yellow is the typically earthly colour...It may be paralleled in human nature, with madness, not with melancholy or hypochondriacal mania, but rather with violent raving lunacy.” Ah, yes, indeed, that good old ‘Artistic Raving Lunacy’—’Sheer Obsessive Creativity!’

“I don’t have a clue” repeated all around the outer rim of the box is surrender to a ‘Higher Power’ or maybe just ‘Exasperation.’ Similarly, “Inspiration Please Inspiration” is written on the outside of the box.

This work is meant to celebrate the sensual revelations of the sacred feminine and interconnected ancestral symbolism. Sustainably minded, my approach, artistic practice,  home, and family life is constantly reverent of form, process, and evolution. Powerfully ritualistic by nature, as cultivated in my own spiritual practice, this work represents a deep connection to culture, tradition, and mysticism that honors the Star Nation, Native-American, and Alkebulan Ancestry. Each terracotta piece is utilized as sacred objects to invoke the divine feminine by utilizing the ancient traditions of altars and altar heartifacts.

The Clay Epoch series is an exploration of ceramic sculpture as receptacles of the human condition through surreal deities and creatures, monolithic idols, and artifacts.

I am fascinated by ceramic’s permanence and record-keeping, by mythos and resonating narratives, and the forms, symbols and aesthe- tic of Prehistoric and Neolithic art. These totems of stone, relics, and vessels, housed spirits, and stories that provided explanation and connection to the strange world surrounding humans and the worlds beyond.

The process of working with clay at a large scale is physical and immersive, inviting us into a meditative state of clairvoyance and spontaneity. Collaborating with clay’s earthy personality to bend, crack, and respond to my physical influence. It is the vehicle through which I feel a similar sense of connection to the external world and internal balance, the clay as well being equally hollow and given meaning as we find its form.

I am a form selector as much as a form maker. I gather parts of the world around me and use them as raw materials for my works. The clay becomes an impression of those materials, and through the serendipity of the process, it eventually reveals what it wants to be.

I am interested in the ideas that relate to how cultures interact, perceive, and manipulate the environment.  A deep appreciation for the physical world, my inspiration comes from the landscape and natural phenomena –“nature doesn’t make mistakes.”  Through the continuous process of building up and tearing down,  I think about the present as well as what no longer exists.  History, personal experience, documentation, ecology, and technological methods are of assistance in my research. Having a multi-disciplinary practice, I incorporate both painting and ceramic culpture. The work embodies an experimental nature using an alchemic approach, where materials become the vehicle for transformation. This information ignites a dialogue and mimics the multiplicity of layers present in a constantly changing environment.

Relocating throughout the U.S. and Australia provides a unique perspective towards contrasting landscapes.  My interests are in the perception of the changing environment, and I repeatedly ask questions about how and why the transformation occurs. Through this lens, my work conveys new ways of looking at the world around us.

I’ve been a graphic design professional for many years, however, my recent work with ceramics at Santa Monica College has allowed me to rediscover a creative energy that I had not enjoyed since my undergrad days at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln.

Incorporating my love of comic books and science fiction, I’m creating ceramic sculptures that are humorous, thought-provoking, and beautiful. It’s a joyful, toy-like world, filled with futuristic vessels and ruled by the gods who hold sway over its inhabitants.

My best friend, a ceramicist who died years ago, always wanted me to study with him. I was afraid of getting my hands dirty, but now I know that he’s somewhere out there laughing with me… and at me.

Lee’s work explores the idea of how a certain mental space and attitude can affect the physicality of a final art object. Eastern art and Shaker design philosophies are large influences in this regard, which can be attributed to her middle class upbringing as a Korean-American.

These sculptures are studies of the ‘Vessel’ as structural figures in both the tangible and metaphorical sense. The use of carving and sanggam technique on hand-built and wheel thrown pieces, combined with little to no added color or glazes, draws attention to the form and surface.

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My current work explores the boundary where significant change occurs: where something ceases and something else begins. A specific line of demarcation, separating two states of being is created using extreme contrast of form and surface. The work is metaphoric with the intent of creating emotional resonance.

I am drawn to simple, minimalistic archetypal forms that reflect the geometries of nature. Weathered stones are a central inspiration for me. These perfect forms emerge through the planetary process of plate tectonics where cooling magma from deep in the Earth is brought to the surface and subjected to the physics of erosion over eons. These rounded shapes can be seen on any beach, in any stream bed. Echoes of this timeless progression are reflected in my work.

My approach is very much material and process oriented. Early on, I was attracted to the technical challenge and aesthetic possibilities of working with soluble metal salts on unglazed clay. These “watercolors” penetrate the bisque-fired clay and become an integral part of the material after firing. I am attracted to intricate, abstract patterns that cannot be comprehended at a single glance, and invite indepth exploration. My rounded forms are designed to be held in one's hands, and when set on a flat surface, gently rock before coming to rest at their own natural balance point.

I tend to work in cycles when making my sculptural pieces or functional pots. Recently, I’ve returned to the type of work I did fifteen years ago, using low-fire and bright colors. I have once again become intrigued by the relationship of the sculptural form and textural surfaces.

My designs evolve around a single image. It is important to me that this image is three- dimensionally complete. Complete in the since that I see it as a sculptural form, floating or sailing in open space. I use sand blasting techniques before and after firing to achieve my textures. I use under glazes for base color and lusters to achieve the pastel glass like quality. I complete the work with over glazes and additional sand blasting. The entire process takes five to six firings between 04 and 019.

Anyone who works in clay is confronted with a multitude of possibilities. Complexity and surprise are built into the medium, process, and technology. Take one purposeful step down an artistic path, and you’re immediately face-to-face with a crossroads that wasn’t on your mental GPS. Should you keep going straight —or what the hell, wouldn’t it be more fun to turn left or right and see what you run into? Exploring the unexpected sideroads has always appealed to me. It’s like going on a walkabout. As a teacher, I always tell my students to “try it and see what happens.” This is my own artistic mantra.

My aesthetic wanderings have been guided by the works of the ancient Minoans, Etruscans, Greeks, and Romans; by Japanese ceramic traditions, Jomon, Haniwa, Iga, Bizen, and Oribe; by artists like Gauguin, Miró, Picasso, Motherwell, Pollock, and George Ohr; and by the ideas of minimalism and other art movements. My modes of working in clay encompass drawing, painting, and printing, as well as handbuilding, moldmaking, and throwing — if only, sometimes to smash a pot on the wheel or to engineer its collapse.

What I hope unites my work is a sense of the excitement I experienced in going offroad —and there’s still so much to explore out there.

Inspired by the sensuality of the natural world, I utilize botanical forms with their openly displayed reproductive elements as a metaphor for human sexuality. By creating abstracted flower blooms with layers of detail, my intentions are to inspire the viewer to explore the work in the same way one explores nature.

Eliminating the presence of stems, leaves, and roots removes the physical context of the plants, allowing the viewer to focus on the form specifically in terms of itssexuality. The exaggerated form of the stamens and pistils create a visual language referencing corre- lations between the botanical forms and characteristics of the human body.

These biomorphic forms are designed to lead the viewer to a subconscious association between nature and the human instinct of attraction. Through my work, I’m questioning ideas of beauty, eroticism, adaptation, acceptance, attraction, and desire.

My current work, partially affected by my new interest in quilting, has a strong affinity to pattern; sometimes organized, sometimes free. Orderly patterns, symmetric configurations, or fractals with their never-ending repetitions intrigue me. Contrarily, I sometimes take the opposite tact –reveling in abstract imperfections and chaos itself. The latter is true of my Cracked Egg Shell series, executed with random colored clay lines and ragged edges.

My aesthetic viewpoint is less about what my art says, but about what I leave out. The things “left out” are obscure references, indistinct or difficult to understand concepts, and contrived thinking. When I found ceramics, some 45 years ago, my life was consumed with the responsibilities of being a wife, mother, and housekeeper. The results of these activities were mostly fleeting, unremarkable, even routine —not necessarily unimportant or unfulfilling, but they were not measurable. Ceramics provided something concrete, something permanent, that I could point to and say “This is what I did today.” My art provides an actual accounting of work, effort, and especially expression. It is dependent on visual imagination but conveyed through REAL physical materials —what I can touch, see, and feel.

With all the possible vehicles that could interest a ceramic artist, why shoes?  Curiously, shoes are not just ordinary objects, they are among the most complicated and fascinating ways of expressing oneself. Shoes communicate, call up memories, awaken emotions, evoke nostalgia, and have always represented erotica.

For many years, the coexistence of opposites has influenced my work, and ceramic shoes are a way of exploring that phenomenon — the soft image of leather and fabric and the hardness of clay and glazes. Shoes are playful, fanciful and fantastic. I can transform realistic versions of them into sometimes dream-like creations by using a rich variety of forms and surfaces.

My greatest satisfaction takes place in the final stages of production, in adding finishing touches such as ribbons, found objects, tassels and beads, flirting with the prospect of almost going too far.

The shoes exhibited here, as are all my creations, are unique, one-of-a-kind. Moreover, the design of shoes represents only one dimension of my work.

I also engage in the full range of functional and sculptural ceramics, mainly working on commissions, serving the special requests of my clientele.

I see all art as being political. And being a contrarian sort of creature, and now that my country is becoming a joke, I feel a strong need to get serious. It is a rather hard thing to face a reality, to deal with stupidity. I would like to suggest a strong drink, a liquid courage. But as you see, the jug is empty. Reality bites just like an angry pig. This is a trial by fire. This is one place where life imitates art; for just like pieces in a kiln, some people crack, some explode, and the good become better from being painted by fire.

"For me, a successful piece casts an elegant shadow, vibrates with inner power, and celebrates the colors and patterns of nature."

        – Liza Riddle

I am creating a body of work titled FORCE, which draws and reflects on my life experiences. My objective is to capture a moment in time, a moment in the inexorable process of desiccation, cracking, and destruction I have so  often observed in nature.  These works are quiet, but evoke a sense of power and resonate with contained energy; the sharp-edged surface tiles are seemingly just on the edge of destruction.

My work is hand-built, with wet clay applied to a previously-fired form. As the surface clay dries and contracts, it cracks and breaks into random or repetitive geometric patterns, forming irregular polygons, three-point stars, or small tiles. After firing, I paint the clay with water soluble metals, using iron, nickel, cobalt, and other metal salts. Through trial and error I have developed my own metal salt mixtures and techniques for applying these almost transparent watercolors. After a final firing, the metals fix and transform, revealing the earth’s elemental palette of colors.

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At eight years old I was placed in foster care and later came to be adopted at the age of twelve. Being thrust from the familiar into the unfamiliar is terrifying. I remember spending much of my time observing in order to gain a better understanding of my new environment. This is a skill we are losing as a society, the ability to see beyond our own perspective.

Presently, people around the world are being driven from their “familiar” into the unfamiliar every day. My current body of work, Diasporas, is intended to pay tribute to the internal strength necessary to endure extreme conditions and still have the will to carry on. We as a society must learn to see things from alternate perspectives and make a shift towards living with compassion.

My work draws inspiration from Aboriginal culture and textiles.  I blend traditional, functional forms with sculptural attributes in order to present a larger concept. Gravitating towards unglazed surfaces, I use dark colored clay bodies and employing the use of slips and oxides. The hope for my work is that it provides viewers with a sense of connection to a global community and a desire to see beyond the familiar.

My work has its basis in traditional pottery. First and foremost, I consider myself an artist/ potter. I draw and paint using traditional ceramic processes to achieve particular effects on my work in order to exploit and develop form. My concern with nature is revealed through my use of animal and bird imagery. Marks of stamps, inscribed lines, and the touch of a brush emulate this fantasy in nature. Included in this colorful landscape are dragonflies, a dash of gold, a glimpse of purple, and brilliant blues. Saying that, I am not particularly interested in a specific genus but rather in that fleeting moment, the leap of faith if you will, when they are suspended in air for a brief moment. The quick yet magic moment when they seem oblivious to gravity, suspended, or “braking” as they gracefully land on the most delicate of branches. The dragonflies’ rush and dip across the puddles leaving only a trace. Included in this rapture is my use of creatures imbued with the human condition.

The intimacies of these anthropomorphic lovers expose my wit and curiosity of the human condition. To paraphrase Susan Peterson’s quote of Hamada, each morning while I’m having my coffee, I sit and watch with delight as the birds and dragonflies dance and converse around the feeders. I am amazed because the birds always carry on the same prattle, yet it is always different and continues to delight and amaze me, and I am grateful for the opportunity to take part in this venture. The drawn landscape dwells somewhere inside and it is with great anticipation and patience that I wait to open the kiln and expose joy, or sometimes grief, of life. Interspersed with this are both personal and worldly experiences, such as religious personifications as well as events like Sadam’s burning of the oil wells in Kuwait and the 9/11 catastrophe. The giving and sharing of my pots will enhance one’s life. My pots are made to experience and use.

Life in the city is full of fun, but everything tends to blur into one color and lose detail over time.

In puppetry, we create objects that will come to life via the puppeteer’s hand to tell a particular story. To animate the inanimate. Working with clay has a primitive pleasure. The “life” created as form is built from water and earth. If it could only be kept at the leather-hard stage, where the clay pushes back with its cold damp patina and still feels alive. The work would be complete right at that state –no color or embellishments, just the forms speaking. But as a figure dries out and is fired, the original shrinks and dies, becoming a shell archive of itself. Breathing life back in is the goal. Waking up the inanimate to tell its story, as the puppeteer does.

Each of my pieces tells its own story. They are folk tales of confidence and being brave; imagined in archetypal characters and forms which are childlike, androgynous, innocent, and playful. They aim to invoke a feeling of vulnerability, yet create a sense of risk. Confidence, being delicate in its beginnings, is lit by a sense of purpose. Images of fire imply pilot lights on and exposed to the elements. They require care in order to not be blown out.

In terms of my approach towards clay, I’m interested in the idea of natural forms that are refined down to the basic gestures.  In the aesthetic sense, I interpret natural form as a singular being, something whole, without distractions. Nature in my perspective is making the most out of the least.  I believe that is the essence of the stability in mind and body.  I also believe that people can acquire a greater sense of happiness by surrounding themselves with simple and underwhelming objects and forms.  I want my work to look as if I did as little to it as possible, even if I actually spent countless hours on details and refinements. When I see beauty, there should be relaxation that does not require unnecessary details. I have been working on this form for a year, filtering ideas over and over until it only shows what's necessary. Through each idea and model, my visual intent became clearer: How does one interpret tranquility of a raindrop, while acting like a river at the save time?

The Yoon Bud Vase is a flow container that is designed to interpret the tranquility of a raindrop, while flowing like a river. The bud vase is made through slip casting. The form used to make the mold was digitally modeled and 3D printed. For glazing, I used a satin glaze to minimalize reflections on the piece. Overall, my goal was to create a pure and whole form that conveys calm-ness and fluidity inspired by nature.

Making ordinary functional-ware on the pottery wheel is a meditational process for me; however, it is more exciting to explore possibilities of different techniques, creating unique shapes, firing temperatures, surface decoration, and inputing some messages or meaning into the piece. As a former graphic designer, I like the thinking process and sketching them out on the paper. Afterward, I do research based on the subject in order to get correct images and how to interpret the ideas into the final work. In the end, I hope these works speak both to me and others.

The mask idea was derived when I happened to come across Mexican professional wrestlers with colorful masks when I was switching TV channels.  My ideas are the reflection of current cultures, such as superhero movies and animation, internet Emoji explosion, and Japanese comic imports.

These three pieces are slip cast porcelain and cleaned up with fine sand paper, then painted with underglazes on the bisque. They are protected with the cone 6 clear glaze.

Clay has allowed me to make something tangible out of fond memories.

I remember that I always looked forward to persimmon season. My grandmother would pick persimmon, or kaki, that grew in her backyard at just the right time so that we could enjoy their sweet crunchiness. Many years later, when I was making a mold of some kaki, I could almost hear her voice asking me why I wasn’t peeling them to eat rather than encasing them in plaster. I glazed the cast persimmons a bright orange, to match the fruit on the trees.

Because one can have only so many inedible kaki displayed in a bowl I began to consider other uses for the kaki shapes. I thought of the wooden kokeshi that my grandmother brought from Japan when she was a young woman. Its specialness made clear by its position high on her bookshelf, beyond my childhood reach. The combination of the persimmon and kokeshi forms resulted in my ceramic kaki-kokeshi dolls.

My grandmother’s kokeshi now has a special place on my own bookshelf and provides memories and continuing inspiration –always well within my reach.

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