WPCC Hosts Free Pottery Demo by Accomplished Potter

Western Piedmont Community College (WPCC) will host a pottery demonstration by North Carolina potter Ronan Peterson on Friday, February 5, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. in the College’s Professional Crafts: Pottery Studio on the main campus at 1001 Burkemont Avenue.  The free demonstration is open to the public,

During the demonstration, Peterson will demonstrate wheel-thrown altered potter and decorating techniques as well as discuss his personal experiences as a studio potter.  An exhibition of Peterson’s artwork will follow at 5:30 p.m. at the Hamilton Williams Gallery located at 403 East Union Street, in downtown Morganton. Peterson’s art work will be on display at Hamilton Williams Gallery for one month following this event for students to have the opportunity to practice his techniques and spend time looking at his pottery.

Peterson received his bachelor of the arts degree in anthropology/folklore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1996.   His interest in folklore led him to Western North Carolina’s John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown where he began taking ceramics classes.  Later he entered the Penland School of Crafts as a core student in a two-year intensive work exchange program where he studied with a number of internationally known artists and craftspeople.

Peterson is a full-time studio artist living and working in Chapel Hill.  His ceramics studio, Nine Toes Pottery, produces highly decorative and functional earthenware vessels. His work is drawn from processes of growth and decay in the natural world and translated into a ceramic comic book interpretation of both real and imagined phenomena.

Peterson’s work has been featured in both Ceramics Monthly and Clay Times magazines.  His pottery is in permanent collections of the North Carolina Pottery Center, Seagrove and the Governor Morehead School in Raleigh.  Recent exhibitions include solo shows at the Kiln Gallery in Fairhope, Alabama, Mudfire Gallery in Atlanta, Georgia, and Charlie Cummings Gallery in Gainesville, Florida. Peterson has taught at local craft centers and ceramics studios throughout the Southeast including Penland School of Crafts and Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts.

To view more of his work, visit www.ninetoespottery.com. For more information about this event or pottery classes, contact Courtney Long, WPCC Professional Crafts coordinator, at (828) 448-3552.