NCECA 2016

March 26, 2016Jenny Dowd

Last week we traveled to Kansas City for the 50th Annual NCECA Conference (National Council on Education for Ceramic Arts.) Now home and excited about new ideas, I should be eager to get back to work. The studio is clean and ready... instead I'm tired and feel as though I'm staring at a humongous blank canvas. I've spent this past week reading, planning, mapping project deadlines and mostly processing a vast list of new ideas for myself and my students... all while thinking about the amazing artwork I saw in the galleries during the conference. Sometimes it is nice to feel stuffed full to the brim, as soon as I sleep it off, I'll be hungry for more.

My work was included in the exhibition Around the Corner. This show highlighted the art of several graduates from the University of Missouri-Columbia as well as our professor and mentor, Bede Clarke. I took this opportunity to experiment and make a large modular piece: That moment, an attempt to capture the very instant attraction takes place. The show is beautiful and I'm so happy to have been included, if only I had taken more photographs of my colleague's work.

Sam was included in an exhibition at the Thornhill Gallery at Avila College, Yoshi and Friends. This exhibition honored the legacy of Yoshi Ikeda and his students from Kansas State University. Yoshi made a big impact on both of us, myself as an undergraduate at KSU and Sam as a graduate student. We miss him but attempt to pass his humor and dedication on to our students.