Red Lodge Clay Center – Ted Neal Kiln Building (AIA) 2023
Hunter Jarvis is a ceramic artist from Seattle, Washington. His utilitarian style is concerned with the use of pots in an everyday setting. He is currently a fourth-year student at the University of Montana College of Visual Arts and Media, where he is pursuing a BA degree in Art and a minor in Media Arts. While studying at the University of Montana, he is developing his own style of utilitarian pots that are focused heavily on everyday use with a hint of elegancy.
I am interested in pottery that has a use. A mug for coffee in the morning, a bowl for cereal, a cup for orange juice, a pitcher for flowers. These pots that decorate and take over your cupboards are symbols for who we are individually. When you reach for a mug, a cup, or bowl and you feel the way it offers itself to you makes you feel connected to the piece. We are the pottery that we use and it’s a reflection of ourselves.
I always wondered how pottery can affect everyone. The utilitarian approach is the way that I found to have the biggest reach. Handmade pottery allows for the consumer to interact with the artist to feel what they felt during their individual making process. Pottery has a way of weaving into our daily lives through use and decorates our living spaces with character and elegance. Pottery reflects our reality by the pots that we use.
I love to make things with my hands because the need for beautiful and elegant pots needs to be made with elegant hands. I have found there to always be this dance between creation and ideas which drives the making process. Ideas that exude usefulness and neediness. Utilitarian pottery is what helps drive these ideas and creations into the everyday lives.