The Center for Craft, Creativity and Design (CCCD) has launched ENEWS to keep you current with all our programs, exhibits and events. ENEWS will be sent out monthly with most news linking to more lengthy information found on our website www.craftcreativitydesign.org. Announcements cards will still be mailed for upcoming exhibits and talks. If you are on our mailing list to receive an announcement card for exhibits and would prefer to receive the information through ENEWS, please let us know and it will save us a stamp!

Melissa G. Post, Curator at the Mint Museum of Craft + Design, has been named Assistant Director of the Center for Craft, Creativity and Design (CCCD), a regional center of the University of North Carolina. She has served in her current position for the last four and a half years working with Mark Leach, Founding Director and Chief Curator of The Mint. Post begins her position December 4.

“The Center for Craft, Creativity & Design is internationally recognized as a leader in advancing craft and design, and I am honored to have the opportunity to work with the Executive Director Dian Magie and the Board of Directors in promoting the Center’s mission. I also look forward to collaborating with the broad community of artisans, collectors, critics, educational institutions, museum professionals, and scholars who have helped propel the Center into national prominence. Together, by encouraging scholarship, supporting artists, and presenting dynamic exhibitions, we will continue to foster a greater understanding and appreciation of craft, creativity and design.”

During her 15 year tenure in the arts, Post has juried exhibitions, lectured, and authored several publications on contemporary craft, artists and collectors. She holds Bachelors’ degrees from Miami University and a Masters degree from The Bard Graduate Center for the Studies in the Decorative Arts, Design and Culture. She was also an Artist in Residence at Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts (2005) and the Jentel Critic at the Bray (2006), a residency, which fosters critical writing on ceramics.

Critical writing and research in American studio craft is the focus of the Craft Research Fund Post will be directing. Now in it’s third year, the program awards $100,000 in grants each year for projects and graduate research that advances, expands and supports scholarship in the field of studio craft in the United States. She will also develop www.crafthistory.org, a portal linking to existing scholarship and opportunities on U.S. studio craft, an initiative recommended by participants in the 2006 national Craft “think-tank” CCCD has sponsored annually beginning in 2002. In addition to the research component, Post will curate one or more exhibitions each year.

SOFA CHICAGO is a premier art exposition of masterworks bridging the decorative and fine arts with over 1300 artists represented by 99 international galleries from 16 countries (www.sofaexpo.com). The 13th Annual SOFA CHICAGO will take place November 9-12, on Navy Pier. This is the third year that CCCD has had a booth in the resource area of this expo, along with representatives of major museums (e.g. Racine Art Museum and the Museum of Arts & Design), craft magazines (e.g. American Craft Council, Ceramics Monthly, Fiberarts), and educational programs such as Penland and the California School of the Arts.

CCCD is sponsoring a lecture, Critical Writing on Craft- Who Benefits, as part of the SOFA CHICAGO 2006 Lecture Series held Friday, November 10th and Saturday, November 11th. The Lecture Series includes 31 presentations by renowned artists, collectors and arts professionals. The CCCD panel presentation on Friday, November 10 at 1:30pm will be moderated by CCCD board member and Penland School of Crafts Director Jean McLaughlin. Sitting on the panel are Bruce Metcalf, jeweler and co-author of 20th Century American Studio Craft the history/text being written under the auspices of CCCD; Jim Romberg, clay artist and faculty at Eagleheart Center for Art and Inquiry in Colorado; and Andrew Glasgow, CCCD board member and Executive Director of the international Furniture Society. Information on the 2007 Craft Research Fund grant program administered by CCCD will be outlined during the panel session, and questions answered during the Expo at the CCCD booth.

The exhibit, curated by Brevard wood fire potter Judith Duff, has garnered international media recognition. The exhibit is divided between two sites, the CCCD gallery and the Katherine Smith Gallery at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina, and includes work of the most acclaimed wood fire artists in the U.S. and Canada. The artists were selected for their approach to design complimenting the September residency by Danish clay artist Nina Hole. Clay Times September-October issue devoted two full pages to the exhibit. Artists in the exhibit include: Mary Bowron (Maryland) Frank Boyden (Oregon), Joy Brown (Connecticut), Judith Duff (North Carolina), Bill Griffith (Tennessee), Lynne Johnson (British Columbia, Canada), Randy Johnston (Wisconsin), Nina Hole (Denmark) Jan McKeechie-Johnston (Wisconsin), Tim Rowan (New York), Steve Sauer (Washington), Jeff Shapiro (New York), Al Tennant (Washington) and Malcolm Wright (Vermont). The CCCD Gallery in Hendersonville is open, free to the public, Tuesday through Saturday, 1-5pm. The Catherine J. Smith Gallery, 733 Rivers Street, is open free to the public Monday through Friday, 10am-5pm.

The 36pp, four-color catalog for the current exhibit is now available online with essays by curator Judith Duff and writer Susan Lefler. Hard copies of the catalog can be ordered from CCCD, PO Box 1127, Hendersonville, NC 28791 for $5 each.

“Currents,” a large wall sculpture by Joy Brown in the Architectural Echoes in Clay exhibit was purchased by June Lamb as a gift to UNC Asheville in recognition of the exceptional collaboration of western Carolina universities, schools, and the craft artists involved in the exhibit and the two years of planning for the Nina Hole residency. June attended both the opening of Architectural Echoes and the unveiling of the Nina Hole “Fire Sculpture” in Boone, meeting many of the artists, students and faculty involved in this exciting undertaking.

Center for Craft, Creativity and Design Exhibitions in November
Gallery hours: 1-5pm, Tu-Sat

Photo caption: "Currents" 2004, 34 x 57 inches, wood fired stoneware by Joy Brown.

November 21, 2006 through February 16, 2007

Twenty-one clay artists - faculty, and current and graduated students - will display their work in the galleries of the Craft Center from November 21, 2006 through February 16, 2007. Megan Wolfe, now in her 10th year as clay faculty, is responsible for the amazing growth of the clay program, in part because her teaching style encourages students to explore and develop their own unique approach to ceramics. This is very evident in the exhibit that ranges from delicate porcelain functional dinnerware, to sculpture using paper clay, and work fired in the large UNC Asheville anagama built after Megan arrived. Josh Copus, a graduating senior who mines “wild” clay and fires with wood received one of the ten $15,000 2006 Windgate Fellowships in steep competition with students nominated from 54 universities across the country. Laura Aultman, received her M.F.A. from University of Florida at Gainesville after graduating from UNCA, and returned this year to teach in the program while Megan is on sabbatical and enjoying her son, Winston born in August. Six UNC Asheville ceramic students, and Laura Aultman, participated in the Nina Hole residency in Boone, helping to create the amazing Fire Sculpture.

The exhibit includes faculty: Megan Wolfe and Laura Aultman; alumni: Kyle Carpenter, Terrell Whitworth, Jason Witherspoon, Maria Andrade Troya, Annie Singletary, Heather Knight, Cheryl Andrews, Sahar Al-abed Fakhoury, and Matt Jacobs; students: Will Rogers, Ben Crowfoot, Charla Wall, Michael Cole, Jay Roberts, Lillian Byers, Peter Wentz, Josh Copus, Sean Fairbridge, Amanda Meyers.

The Gallery will be closed for the Thanksgiving Holiday November 23-26.

Photo caption: Wild clay bottles, wood fired, by Josh Copus, 2007 Windgate Fellow

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