Our featured artist for today is Susan Feagin,  who you may have met if you’ve taken a class at the Penland School of Crafts recently.  She is currently the record holder for the longest serving and most cheerful clay studio coordinator, and she makes very nice handbuilt ceramic work as well.  She told us a little about her work and how she got here:

I’m from Atlanta, Georgia and I’ve been here at Penland School for three years now as the Clay Studio Coordinator. I came to Penland for the first time for a wood-fire workshop in 1994 soon after I learned how to throw at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1990. I continued taking clay classes at Penland when I could and later became a core student in 1998 and 1999. I received a masters degree at the University of Florida in 2007.  I may have taken the long road, but it’s great to back at Penland.

My recent work is hand-built vessels that are meant to be cheerful, lively, and colorful. I screen print patterns and handwriting onto the slabs that I use to build. I use drape molds and paper patterns to help design the forms.  When the pots are leather-hard, I go back and add sgraffito decorations. I haven’t always made work like this and I still consider this to be a new body of work. In the past I’ve only thrown and it’s a great to make asymmetrical forms that have more personality.