Today we’d like to introduce you to Joey Sheehan.
Hi Joey, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for sharing your story with us – to start, maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers.
I took my first ceramics class in college while pursuing a BFA and art history minor and found that I loved it. I asked my professor where I could keep working in the summer, and he let me take a two-week wood firing workshop at the Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts. After this immersive experience, I knew I wanted to find a way to make clay into a career. After graduating, I moved to Asheville in 2006 to accept a two-year residency position at the Odyssey Center. I stayed there for another year as the studio tech and eventually opened my studio in the River Arts District. During this time at the Odyssey Center, I developed my ideas and craft into the type of pots I make today. After working in the river district and running a cooperative ceramics gallery there for many years, I finally purchased a home in Madison County with my wife to allow us to build a new studio and, most importantly, my kilns! I started by creating a large two-chamber wood kiln, then added a smaller gas reduction kiln just a few years ago. In the meantime, we built a working studio from the ground up and began raising our daughter, who just turned 7. It has been a real family affair as my mom, dad, wife, and even her brother and father pitched in to help build the studio and wood kiln. I now work in my home studio, firing my gas kiln often and my large wood kiln about twice a year. I sell my work as a member of the clay space co-op in the river district and several other regional galleries and craft shows.
Would it have been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Any artist or self-employed person never has a smooth road. It is a hard choice and lifestyle to make a living with what you make by hand. An actual balancing act is being played out every day. I am a maker. I molded, cleaned, fired, and glazed every finished piece.
But on top of that, I must know how to market, price, ship, build a website, manage social media, prepare tax documents, fix an air compressor, stack brick, and run plumbing and electric lines. It’s like having ten jobs, not just one, which can be frustrating and exhausting. Many people look at Potter and say, or even say, “Oh, how fun it must be to play in the mud all day.” But they must catch the part you can’t fire because the propane wasn’t delivered on time, the clay supplier changed their recipe, and all your pots are cracking in half out of the kiln. There are dozens of steps in making each pot, and something can go wrong at every level.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might need to become more familiar, what can you tell them about what you do?
I make both functional and sculptural ceramics using high-fire stoneware clays. The clay comes from Starworks in Star, NC, and is made from base clays dug locally in NC. Here is my basic artist statement that details what I do. I will follow it up with a bit more. I began exploring clay over 20 years ago and was immediately captivated by the material and the wheel. Realizing that I could create something beautiful and useful simultaneously was profoundly invigorating. As I began grasping the concepts of making and form, my interest fell into surface and color. Textural porcelain slips and layered glazes create bright, flowing, and volatile surfaces. As I have grown and matured in life, my work has followed. I am still fascinated by glaze and surface but with a higher understanding of form and flow. I am deeply influenced by classical shapes and why and how they were made. I attempt to embrace these studied forms but with a contemporary twist. In my current method of firing in a large two-chamber wood kiln as well as a newly built gas “car” kiln, I am exploring the interaction between form and fire, building a relationship in each piece between function, the surface of the pot, and the story of the firing process. I have also been pushing my limits of making and firing with large-scale figurative and abstract sculpture. These pieces present challenges in making, moving, and firing, ensuring I constantly study and learn. Each piece is made and placed conscientiously in the kiln with expectation and openness—a desire for success and a pupil’s acceptance of the result. I am best known for my work’s textural spirals and glaze layering. I think of the larger platters and bowls I make as a canvas for the glazes. I am creating colorful patterns that evoke many impressions often witnessed in the natural world.
What quality or characteristic do you feel is most important to your success?
I know it is cliche, but hard work and perseverance have always been my motto. It takes a lot of self-discipline to make it on your own. And a lot of failure. You have to take a different look at things when working with clay. You’re constantly trying new things that often don’t work, and you have to understand that it is not failure; it is just part of the creative process. As I have gotten older, I also have acknowledged how important time management is. I must balance my time in the studio with family and friends, home management, and time for just living and having fun! I need to have that kind of balance, which makes my path sustainable.
Pricing:
- I make work from $18.00 to $3,500.00, so it is approachable to all consumers, and there is something for everyone.
- Prices have increased to compensate for the general rise in materials and business, but I try to keep them as low as possible to not sticker-shop my customers.
- Artists generally ask what they truly believe their work is worth and what they must keep doing. So, if you appreciate it, don’t try to haggle.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.meltingmountainpottery.com
- Instagram: @joeymakespots
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joey.sheehan.35/
