"Willow Luminaries-White"

Tabbatha Henry

"My goal is to express the simple beauty of the natural world through my designs. The textures and patterns of the forest and sky provide never ending inspiration for my work in porcelain."

Winter in Vermont is a time of unparalleled beauty. It is a time of calm and of comfort, yet also survival and heartiness. It is black and white with subtle, sublime color, ever-changing as the sun and moon glide across the snowy landscape offering unending inspiration. Porcelain is the perfect medium in which to express the ephemeral quality of light in winter. Mimicking the snowy landscape, it is a blank canvas upon which i am able to express the tranquility and power of the season.

The luminaries are slipcast in porcelain and then each is hand decorated before firing. Depending on the design, they take anywhere from two to three days to produce before they are ready for the kiln. Each line is drawn by hand. The process is intensive, but the results are well worth it. The pendants are all hand-built with hand applied texture and glaze. They are fired three times for desired glaze effect. As with the luminaries, no two are exactly the same.

Tabbatha fell in love with clay while in a required art course in college, and upon graduation set out to learn as much as she could on her own. She honed her technical skills through apprenticeships, studio work-exchanges, and good ole' trial and error. She later returned to graduate school and received her MFA in Ceramics from the School for American Crafts at the Rochester Institute of Technology. She has been a practicing studio artist ever since.