Janis Mars Wunderlich Workshop

Imaginative Figures In Clay

Janis Mars Wunderlich teaches this fast-paced three day, hands-on sculpture workshop focusing on expressive figurative sculpture. Participants will learn a multitude of techniques for hand building sculptures, adding texture, and glazing techniques. Janis will help participants develop intricately layered surfaces, while discussing personal imagery and translating the struggles and joys of everyday life into figurative form.

Workshop content will go beyond the technicalities of making, as Janis shares an abundance of ideas about studio set-up, working with galleries, exhibiting and selling work, and other practical advice from her experiences as a busy artist and mother. Participants will gain an appreciation for how Janis's life experiences shape her artwork, while learning to interpret the events that surround them into richly detailed imaginative figures in clay.

Class size 18.

Janis Mars Wunderlich Bio

Born in Akron, OH in 1970, Janis Mars Wunderlich received her BFA from Brigham Young University (Provo,Utah) and an MFA from The Ohio State University (Columbus, OH). As a full-time, at-home artist and mother of five, Wunderlich has spent many years trying to balance art and family matters. Her deeply personal, narrative works capture the exhaustion and excitement of a busy family life, full of creative images, domestic duties, and nurturing responsibilities. Adapting to the frequent interruption of family duties, and with children working along her side in her studio, Wunderlich has managed to create an impressive and excessive body of work.

While older work often showed the darker struggles of parenting, her newer work focuses on the humor, intensity, and intricacy of family life. A recipient of several honors and grants, her work has been in hundreds of national and international exhibitions, and can be seen nationally and internationally in public and private collections. In any spare time she finds, she lectures and conducts workshops at several universities and art centers in the U.S. and Canada.

Janis Mars Wunderlich
Artist Statement

As a busy creative artist and parent to several wonderfully rambunctious children, I am a grateful recipient of an unending flow of quirky, make-believe imagery. The books and tales we read, the pets that parade around us, dress up time, homework time, even dinner time with all the ensuing chaos- every moment of my day brings another situation which my mind churns into images. But coupled with that instantaneous inspiration is a continuous, unending flow of daunting housework, crusty laundry, piles of dishes, domestic overload, wrestling matches and squirmishes, and edgy, independent teenage attitude!

This fantastic dichotomy of family life frustrates and fascinates me, and I use my artwork as a way to process all of the beautiful and frenzied contrasts that make up my day. In an attempt to balance studio time with all the domestic issues and family needs, I literally integrate studio/sculpture time into my routine all day long. It is not uncommon for me to be making dinner, working on a sculpture, and telling a story to my kids at the same time to keep them entertained. So it should come as no surprise that there are a lot of juggling, balancing, writhing creatures with complicated surfaces!

I have come to realize that the core of my individual identity is wrapped up in my family. The mothering, nurturing, and protective instincts within me are so inherent that I tend to playfully blend human imagery into animalistic imagery in my mind. The intricate surfaces of my ceramic mother figures are laden, even dripping with kids. The figure is clearly overwhelmed and almost engulfed in the frenzy. But it is precisely this writhing, detailed layering that make the figures so delicate and deliciously intriguing. The surfaces almost literally crawl with life as they celebrate the challenges and rewards of family life.

Janis Mars Wunderlich Resume

Education

MFA, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 1994

BFA, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 1992

Grants

Five-time recipient of an Ohio Arts Council Individual Artist Fellowship (2005, 2002, 2000, 1998, 1996)

Two-time recipient of a Greater Columbus Arts Council Individual Artist Grant (2004, 2000)

Three-time recipient of the Virginia A. Groot Foundation Recognition Grant (1996, 1997, 2008)

Lectures and Workshops

Sierra Nevada College, Lake Tahoe, NV

Santa Fe Clay, Santa Fe, NM

California College of Arts and Crafts, Oakland, CA

Purdue/University of Indiana at Ft. Wayne, IN

Baltimore Clayworks, Baltimore, MD

Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI

National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts Conference, Rochester, NY

Alberta College of Art and Design, Calgary, Alberta, Canada

The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH

Springfield Art Museum, Springfield, OH

The Ohio Craft Museum, Columbus, OH

Emporia State University, Emporia, KS

Brigham Young University, Provo, UT

Southern Ohio Art Museum, Portsmouth, OH

Ohio University, Athens, OH

Penland School of Art and Crafts, Penland, NC

Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware, OH

Miami University, Oxford, OH

Hawken School, Cleveland OH

Clay Art Center, NYC

Otterbein College, Worthington, OH

NCECA Conference, Louisville, KY

Lawrence Arts Center, Lawrence, KS

Kent State University, Kent, OH

Odyssey Center for the Arts, Asheville, NC

Huntington Museum of Art, WV

Bibliography

Feature article and cover of December 1999 issue of CERAMICS MONTHLY.

Numerous articles in AMERICAN CRAFT, AMERICAN STYLE, CLAY TIMES and others

Featured in the book, THE BEST OF NEW CERAMIC ART, by Toni Sikes

Catalogues for VISUAL PERSPECTIVES: VIRGINIA GROOT AWARDS , CONFRONTATIONAL CLAY, LIFE INSIGHT: THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE, DIVERSE DOMAIN-CONTEMPORARY NORTH AMERICAN CERAMIC ART, POETIC EXPRESSIONS OF MORTALITY.

Featured in the books 500 FIGURES IN CLAY and THE FIGURE IN CLAY, and 500 ANIMALS IN CLAY, all published by Lark Books.

CONFRONTATIONAL CERAMICS, by Judith Schwartz, and HAND BUILDING, a Lark Book by Shay Amber

Exhibits

Hundreds of national and international exhibitions including…

DIVERSE DOMAIN- CONTEMPORARY NORTH AMERICAN CERAMIC ART at Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan

CONFRONTATIONAL CLAY at The American Craft Museum, NY, NY

VISUAL PERSPECTIVES: 14 YEARS OF THE VIRGINIA GROOT AWARD, SOFA Chicago, IL

GROWING PAINS at Ohio Arts Council's Riffe Gallery, Columbus, OH

NCECA CLAY NATIONAL at UNLV's Barrick Museum, Las Vegas, NV

SCRIPPS 55th CERAMIC ANNUAL at Scripps College's Chandler Gallery, Claremont, CA

HEIM UND HANDWERK, Munich Convention Hall, Munich, Germany

FIGURINES at John Elder Gallery, NY, NY

TELLING TALES at The Craft Alliance, St. Louis, MO

AMERICAN FIGURATIVE CLAY, Colorado College's Coburn Gallery, Colorado Springs, CO

WOMEN'S WORLD: A WORK IN PROGRESS, The Brookfield Craft Center, Brookfield, CN

FIGURES IN CLAY at Odyssey Center for the Arts, Asheville, NC

INTIMATE CONVERSATIONS, The Society of Arts and Crafts, Boston, MA

LOOKING IN THE MIRROR: ASPECTS OF FIGURATIVE CERAMICS, Riley Hawk Galleries, Columbus and Cleveland, OH

DIVINE CHAOS, a solo show at Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware, OH

20th CENTURY DECORATIVE WORKS OF ART, to benefit NCECA Endowment, at Sotheby's, NY, NY

ANIMAL MAGNETISM at The Society of Arts and Crafts, Boston

ONCE UPON A TIME, at the Wustum Museum of Fine Art, Racine, WI

A MODERN BESTIARY: ARTISTS VIEW THE ANIMAL KINGDOM, at the Wustum Museum of Fine Art, Racine, WI

BEING HUMAN: THE FIGURE EXPRESSED, Signature Shop Gallery, Atlanta, GA

SHORT STORIES: NARRATIVE CERAMIC ART at the Center for Ceramic Arts, Berkeley, CA

LASTING IMPRESSIONS: THE UNFORGETTABLE IN CONTEMPORARY CERAMIC ART, Baltimore Clayworks

LITTLE CREATURES at the Art Gallery at Florida Gulf Coast University

ANIMATED EARTH: THE MANY PERMUTATIONS OF CLAY at Craft Alliance, St. Louis, MO

SUSPENDED ANIMATION at Goldesberry Gallery, Houston, TX

SMALL FIGURES at Santa Fe Clay, Santa Fe, NM

TWO MEDIA:TWO EXPRESSIONS at the Springfield Museum of Art, OH

POETIC EXPRESSIONS OF MORTALITY at The Mobile Museum Of Art, Mobile, AL

INTIMATE RITUALS OF DAILY LIFE at The Signature Shop Gallery, Atlanta, GA, LIFE INSIGHT: THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE at the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, Louisville, KY

CONTEMPORARY CERAMICS at the Canton Museum of Art, Canton, OH

SOFA at NCECA, Louisville, KY

FORM AND IMAGINATION: WOMEN CERAMIC SCULPTORS at the American Museum of Ceramic Art, Pomona, CA

A HUMAN IMPULSE at the Arizona State Art Museum, Tempe, AZ

CONFRONTATIONAL CERAMICS at the West Chester Arts Council, NY

THE HUMAN FORM IN CLAY at Northern Kentucky University

TELL ME A STORY: CONTEMPORARY NARRATIVE CERAMICS at the White Plains Public Library, NY

Numerous exhibitions at The Society of Arts and Crafts, Boston, MA; John Elder Gallery, NY, NY; The Clay Studio, Philadelphia, PA; The Ohio Craft Museum, Columbus, OH; Santa Fe Clay, Santa Fe, NM; Baltimore Clayworks, Baltimore, MD; Sybaris Gallery, Royal Oak, MI; Ferrin Gallery, Lenox, MA; Goldesberry Gallery, Houston, TX; Wustum/ Racine Art Museum, Racine, WI; Sherrie Gallery, Columbus, OH; Red Lodge Clay Center, MT

Numerous solo exhibitions at John Elder Gallery, SOFA Chicago, Shaw Guido Gallery; JANIS MARS WUNDERLICH: LIFE AS A FAIRY TALE at the Quincy Art Center, Quincy, IL; NEW WORK at The Figurative Gallery, La Quinta, CA; Ford Gallery (Eastern Michigan University), Werner Gallery (Ohio Wesleyan University), FAMILY MATTERS at Sherrie Gallery and SOFA Chicago, NEW WORK at The Huntington Museum of Art, WV

Permanent Museum Collections

The Mint Museum of Craft and Design, Charlotte, NC

The Wustum Museum/ Racine Art Museum, Racine, WI

The University of Arizona Art Museum

The Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan

The Canton Museum of Art, Canton, OH

The American Museum of Ceramic Art, Pomona, CA

Arizona State University Art Museum

And many other public and private collections

Video

Check out Janis in the new documentary film, WHO DOES SHE THINK SHE IS?, directed by academy award-winning Pamela Tanner Boll (executive co-producer of Born Into Brothels). Movie trailer and info can be found at www.whodoesshethinksheis.net