The San Angelo Ceramic Competition, Invitational Exhibition & Symposium

 

The San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts organizes an annual series of ceramic events with exhibitions, a symposium and workshops led by prominent artists.

The San Angelo North American Ceramic Competition, hosted every two years, is open to artists residing in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Clay or ceramic artworks, both functional and sculptural, are eligible for submission. Submissions must have been completed within the last two years. The 2024 competition is juried by Texas ceramic artist and curator Louise Rosenfield.

In a small focus exhibit within the Competition exhibition, the museum features the work of one distinguished guest artist, who also conducts a day-long demonstration workshop the day after the exhibition opening. The 2024 Distinguished Guest Artist is Caddo potter Chase Kahwinhut Earles.

In non-Competition years, the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts hosts the Ceramic Invitational Exhibition, featuring the work of established and emerging ceramic artists selected by the museum.

The San Angelo Ceramic Symposium, hosted by Angelo State University, is an annual event that is open to ASU students, faculty, and the public. It takes place the day of the exhibition opening and is organized in collaboration with the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts.

This April 18 – 22, enjoy an entire weekend of exhibitions, parties, talks, workshops, and activities for all ages!

The Ceramic Competition will be on display at the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts from April 19 to June 23, 2024.

25th San Angelo North American Ceramic Competition
April 19 - June 23, 2024
In Loving Memory of Darlene Williams

Partners: San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts Angelo State University The Chicken Farm Art Center	Venues: San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts Angelo State University The Chicken Farm Art Center Downtown San Angelo
Sponsors: San Angelo Museum Endowment for Ceramic Events Darlene and John Williams Tile Heritage Foundation San Angelo Area Foundation Texas Commission on the Arts J. Christopher Sugg	Supporting Participants: San Angelo Cultural District San Angelo Convention and Visitors Bureau Downtown San Angelo Inc.

 

Click here to see the online gallery

 

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2024 Special Recognitions

Darlene Williams

 
Darlene and John Williams

Darlene Williams was an enthusiastic proponent of the ceramic arts, artists, and the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts. She was an optimistic, funny, and generous person who never talked about herself, but she had a story for every work of art in her collection and every SAMFA ceramics event for more than 20 years past. Darlene and her husband John amassed an impressive and broad-ranging collection of contemporary ceramics, supporting emerging as well as established ceramic artists.

Darlene and John endowed the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts’ San Angelo National Ceramic Competition and the San Angelo Ceramic Invitational, and they have given generous unrestricted financial gifts to the museum and its programs. They have underwritten the museum’s acquisition of many ceramic works and donated more than 65 important ceramic works from their personal collection. For each of these works, Darlene wrote down the story of how and why it was commissioned or acquired. Darlene made sure the legacy of her work and love for ceramics would continue long into the future. She is sorely missed.

Juror: Louise Rosenfield, Dallas, TX

 

Louise Rosenfield is a Dallas, Texas potter who enjoys playing with clay and making functional vessels for daily use.  She prefers making her work from porcelain, which she either decorates with patterns and fires in a wood kiln or applies colorful illustrations and fires in the electric kiln.

Louise Rosenfield in her studio

She proudly serves as a member of the Board of Trustees, the Everson Museum of Art, in Syracuse, New York, where she is proud of her work on the Collections Committee.  Beginning in 2019, Rosenfield has participated as a member of the Archie Bray Foundation Board of Directors, in Helena, Montana.  The Bray is known internationally for its Artist Residency program. Rosenfield concentrates her efforts on the Development Committee. Rosenfield is also a founding organizer of the Dallas Pottery Invitational, an annual show and sale established in 2008 whose mission is to widen public knowledge about the breadth and depth of functional ceramics today.

In addition, Rosenfield has established a website resource for scholars or others looking for inspiration, to see appropriate images of functional pots she owns and uses. The website, rosenfieldcollection.com, offers several views of each work.  High-quality images may be downloaded and used without attribution. Currently over 4,000 works, all made by artists with individual studio practices, are available to examine.

Distinguished Guest Artist: Chase Kahwinhut Earles, Ada, OK

I create my tribe's traditional pottery to help educate and carry on the culture of my people. The once grand and widespread tradition of my people's Caddo pottery has now been reduced to a shadow of its former self and has almost even disappeared completely. With the help of the only living Caddo pottery revivalist, I got started down the path of my artistic expression of our tribe's traditional pottery to help current and future generations of our people understand the beauty, craftsmanship, and uniqueness of our ancient pottery methods and culture.

Born in Oklahoma, I have always been an artist as long as I can remember, from the day the art teacher in kindergarten pulled me aside to draw something for the school. From then on, I was always drawing and painting, but until I found pottery I really didn't have a voice or a reason. Even as I decided to pursue pottery as a more hands-on approach and a closer-to-earth approach to art, I was still lacking meaning. I had considered creating Pueblo pottery from the southwest as that is what had inspired me until I realized that because I am not a Pueblo native, I would be simply replicating Pueblo pottery and not truly creating it. That is until I connected with my tribe and my heritage and learned of the true grandeur of our tradition and how it has been lost and hidden from the public. I then set forth almost obsessively learning the methods and designs of our tribe, creating works of art that are modernized, to educate my tribe's people and the public about our tradition.

All of my tribe's ancient traditional pottery was hand-coiled from clay that was handmade from the local river source, which most notably included the Red River and the Arkansas River. These pottery pieces are then hand-burnished with a rock to look like glass without any glaze. The final touch before firing is the hand carving of the scrolling ancient designs which include motifs centered around the origin stories of my Caddo people. Objects in the motifs include feathers, serpents, the sun and moon, and the everlasting fire. What motivates me and challenges me to push the limits of describing our culture in my pottery art is the desire to truly educate people about what sets our tribe's tradition apart from all the other Southeastern tribes and to reveal to people the extent of which the Caddo's tradition was cherished by everyone across the nation in prehistoric and historic times.

CaddoPottery.com 

2024 Accepted Artists

 

The learn more about Past Ceramic Competitions click HERE.

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