Elmhurst
Host: Tatyana Schierl in the backyard of her home & studio
Tatyana Schierl grew up in Moscow, Russia. Once in America, she attended Macalester College where she fell in love with ceramics. While raising her four children, Tatyana always found a way to get her hands in the mud. However she finally became a full time potter in 2019. Being an avid hiker, she pulls images of nature into her work, finding inspiration in the ordinary. Tatyana draws her images on rice paper. She then applies them to her wares with slips, incorporating underglazes and mason stains for coloring.
David makes small batch functional pottery with an emphasis on showing the natural beauty of materials and process. David strives for surfaces that are rich, natural and tactile, as beautiful to the hand as to the eye. Increasingly, my forms and surfaces reflect the beauty of the Midwest landscape that surrounds me. David’s pots are meant to be used, and meant to be shared. They are pots for quiet conversations or festive celebrations; pots to gather over the table with family and friends. They are meant to inject a moment of reflection, and a sense of intentionality, into our everyday routines.
Kate makes functional stoneware pots that formally draw from rural Wisconsin’s cocoons/chrysalides, bones, and seed pods. Her terra sigillata color palette is that of wild flowers, animal bones, leaves, and stones. Subtle and distinct color shifts encourage closer inspection, consideration and reflection. Simple patterns disrupt the visuals of the forms, maintaining their path, unaffected by the undulations of the form.
Working with clay, Susan feels alive: soul, spirit and body, connected. Susan makes functional and sculptural ceramics for contemplation, relaxation and the practice of life. Her pots invite hands to receive the comfort and power of clay and to explore its fragility, strength and permanence. Quiet nuances inspire her surfaces: buildings tangled with vines, botanical shadows cast on sidewalks, weeds poking through cement, or plant life dancing in the ocean...fleeting moments of beauty made permanent in my brushwork and firing process. Every clay pot tells its own story and can serve as a reminder of our individualism and humanity.
Nishi’s style is based on the simplicity and functionality of Japanese pottery, using natural materials and colors typical in nature. He believes that pottery should not be the center of attention on the dinner table--it should be simple and attractive, while discreetly adding to the delicious appearance of the food. He strives to create pottery that resonates with me and brings out my inner peace.
Norah emigrated from Ukraine at age 3 and grew up in Goshen IN. She worked as a studio assistant for a production potter from 2015-2022. She completed her MFA in ceramics from Notre Dame in 2025. She was featured as an emerging artist by Ceramics Monthly in 2024. She makes functional and one of a kind narrative work in her home studio. She hosts a stop on the Michiana Pottery Tour and serves on the board of the Northern Indiana Clay Alliance.
Kyle has always loved to travel, whether it is to a new campground, or hiking glaciers in Canada. With each new experience, she pull moments in which she found herself wholly present and weave them into her work. With cone 6 porcelain, I use altering and carving to create dynamic textures and movement, keeping these memories alive in Kyle’s work.