I was born in Great Falls, Montana and at age six my family relocated to Soldotna, Alaska; a small fishing town located on the mouth of the Kenai River which many oil field workers and their families (including my own) call home. Luckily, even after we moved up North, we continued to spend part of the year in Montana and so it was between these two places that my appreciation of nature and beauty in its infinite forms took shape. I always felt the need to channel this sense of awe and inspiration into creating, and at age 13, while in middle school art class, I discovered ceramics and instantly knew I needed to pursue it further. 

The following year at the start of high school, I was extremely fortunate to have a mentor and art teacher who allowed me to enroll in her ceramics class as a freshman. Over the next four years, she let me enroll in every one of her ceramics classes, work as her teacher’s aid so I could have extra time to work on projects, and allowed me to come in afterschool hours to throw, glaze and fire in solitude. 

Like many students, I started out with hand building, but with my teacher’s support, my skills developed and eventually I progressed to wheel throwing stoneware and porcelain, both of which I continue to enjoy. My passion for ceramics followed me throughout college, where I continued to enroll in classes. Much of my work presently consists of functional forms with decorative brush designs, painting and textures, often inspired by Alaska’s teeming waterways and the earthen lines and colors of western Montana.