Red Lodge Clay Center – Short-Term Resident/ASPN Mentor 2026
Holly Hanessian is an educator, scholar and studio artist creating artworks that inhabit the overlapping worlds of craft, design and contemporary art through creating socially engaged and installation artwork. She has taught, lectured and exhibited projects internationally and in the United States investigating contemporary ideas on social policies including the environment, social injustices as well as the importance of our haptic senses.
Holly recently retired as Professor of Art at Florida State University where she was the area head of ceramics. She has also served as President of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts, and is a Fellow of the Council for NCECA. Holly is also an active member of the International Academy of Ceramics, the Socially Engaged Craft Collective, ArtAxis, and AccessCeramics.
I use my internal compass for making art that is tied to connecting people together and community building. Past projects ranged from hurricane mitigation, designing sustainable water systems, to investigating agricultural justice issues. These artworks addressed historical and structural problems that require us to change the ways we think about water scarcity in the environment or who grows our food.
I am now redirecting my gaze to making art that holds locally grown food and is placed in handmade vessels to celebrate the collaborative power of food and community. My background in education, leadership, mutual aid, and ceramics will support communities, gather neighbors, and celebrate each other.