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01/31/2024 08:30 AMTracking an inspiring journey that began with her very first pottery class at Guilford Art Center (GAC) just eight years ago, Guilford native Jess Reeve is already a rising artist in the pottery world. In January, Jess began her year-long residency as the new GAC Potter in Residence.
After graduating from Guilford High School in 2010, Jess went on to an art school in New York City to study painting, but says that, “I really didn’t click with the program there.”
After moving back to Connecticut, Jess lived and worked in New Haven. One day, she tagged along with a friend who was taking a class at GAC. Jess decided to join a pottery class. As soon as she began working in the GAC studio, her connection to the art form was instantaneous.
“I really just fell in love with it,” says Jess. “I ended up taking three classes there before applying [to] the University of Hartford’s ceramics program in their art school, and I went back to school and got my degree in ceramics.”
Jess entered the Hartford program in 2016. She now holds a BFA in ceramics from Hartford Art School, as well a completed post-baccalaureate from Colorado State University (CSU), for which students are accepted by portfolio review. Jess lived in Fort Collins, Colorado while undertaking the intensive, one-year CSU studio program, working closely with faculty in the development of her own work.
After leaving Colorado, Jess moved to Portland, Maine to work as a studio assistant with Ayumi Horie Pottery. Most recently, Jess served as production manager at Campfire Pottery in Westbrook, Maine for three years.
Within a relatively small world of professional pottery work, Jess has consistently moved ahead. This effort has required a combination of her talent, the many supportive people within the world of this art form, and a bit of serendipity, Jess feels.
“I feel like the pottery community is really small, and everybody kind of knows everybody,” she says. “I got the opportunity in Colorado because my University of Hartford professor knew someone there and recommended the one-year program. From that, I got the position working for Ayumi Horie because my professor from Hartford and someone from Colorado I had worked with knew her.”
By the time the pandemic brought her studio work with Horie to an end, Jess had already racked up an impressive amount of academic and work experience, helping her win a competitive job opening at Campfire Pottery. Most recently, after wrapping up that role, Jess moved back to Guilford in October of 2023. Here, serendipity struck again.
“Moving back to Connecticut, I wasn’t really sure if I was going to be able to find anything in ceramics. It is super hard, because it’s a small community—which is great, because things can happen by word of mouth—but at the same time, the opportunities are limited. A lot of potters end up moving to different areas of the country for positions because they are so few and far between,” says Jess. “You just have to be able to put yourself out there and be resilient and find ways to continue making your work.”
Jess decided to reach out to GAC.
“I contacted the Guilford Art Center to see if they had anything going on, even as an administrative opening, and it just so happened that the opportunity to apply for the resident potter position was available. It was just so lucky for me,” she says.
Offered annually since 2015, the position is designed to provide the resident with “time and space to develop their own art, while contributing to the workings of a communal pottery studio,” according to information provided by GAC.
Jess began her residency at GAC at the beginning of January. During her year-long residency, she will be participating in open studio hours, working alongside and with artists of all abilities.
“It’s really great because I can work on my own work that I have, and I can assist students with any questions that they have and monitor everything,” says Jess.
Jess also has the distinct opportunity to be working among many talented potters, including Debbie Staub, the same GAC instructor who taught Jess in her very first pottery class.
“The instructors at GAC are amazing, and there are students there who have taken classes for decades, so they’re incredibly talented and super dedicated to their work,” says Jess.
At the end of her tenure, the body of work that Jess creates at GAC during her residency will be featured as a GAC gallery show.
“With the pottery residency, you can develop a body of work that’s totally up to you,” says Jess. “I feel like I have everything I need. They have a really wide range of glazes, you can fire the clay to multiple different temperatures, they offer Raku firing, pit firing, reduction firing, and electric firing. It’s pretty extensive.”
Jess likes to create functional pottery with throwing and hand-building with a focus on decoration, pattern, and color.
“I used to work in vibrant colors, but I spent the past three years working for a pottery studio that had a very neutral, muted palette, and I feel like I learned a lot about color working with them,” she says. “I think it’s nice to find a balance between both muted and bright colors, and so a more nuanced and sophisticated use of color is something that I’m looking to explore more in the work I make this year.”
Other influences in her work include several gained while working with Horie.
“I learned a lot from her. She uses color in a way that I find super interesting, and she uses a lot of techniques that I hadn’t been exposed to, even things as simple as the way in which she dries her pottery, which is very specific,” says Jess. “That was interesting to learn because pottery breaks and cracks so easily, and there’s so much room for error in making pottery. I felt like she had really created a process that was really quite fool-proof. So, I learned a lot from her in regards to having a rigorous studio practice.”
Jess is excited to see what the next year will bring as GAC’s resident potter and says that she will always feel grateful for becoming a part of the GAC community.
“The Guilford Art Center, for me, is a nurturing and lovely community to be a part of, and I think it was a wonderful respite for me at a time where I knew I needed to find a way to be a creative, but the art world in New York was just not jelling for me,” Jess says. “Finding ceramics reignited and refueled my love of making art in a different way. I’m really grateful to the Guilford Art Center.”