Curatorial Statement
Finding the Ground: a solo exhibition of work by Jane Shellenbarger
Exhibition Posted Online: Monday, October 5, 2026 at 10 am MT
Reception with the artist Friday, October 16, 2026, 5-7pm
Both a studio potter and educator, Jane Shellenbarger received her B.F.A. degree from the Kansas City Art Institute, and her M.F.A. from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. Following graduate school, she worked as a resident artist at the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts, in Helena, MT. Shellenbarger established her studio pottery, Mill Station Pottery, in rural Michigan in 1997.
She has held teaching positions at Northern Michigan University and Kansas City Art Institute and currently is a Professor in the School for American Crafts in the College of Art and Design at Rochester Institute of Technology.
Shellenbarger has exhibited her work in several galleries around the country including Leslie Ferrin Gallery, Lacoste Gallery, Philadelphia Clay Studio, Red Lodge Clay Center and Baltimore Clay works among others.
Her work is in the permanent collections of the Renwick Gallery of the National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C.; Ohi Museum, Kanazawa, Ishikawa, Japan; San Bao Ceramic Art Institute, Jingdezhen, China; Weisman Art Museum; San Angelo Museum of Fine Art; University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR; The Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts; and The University Museum, Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville.
My work explores the tipping point between elegant and awkward, crude materiality and refined beauty within historical forms. The familiar object becomes the artifact, speaking of multiple histories and the nuanced and complex relationship we have with objects in our everyday lives.
I am interested in forms that provide both a utilitarian and ritualized experience. These forms provide an excellent format to explore the moment where an expected beauty becomes deconstructed, where familiar objects are reconsidered.
My work is thrown and altered, incorporating a variety of surface treatments. I use dark stoneware clays combined with atmospheric firing to provide a varied surface ground. The surfaces are cultivated using pattern and inlayed slips or imagery to build a layered visual and tactile experience. The pieces often undergo multiple post firings to create depth as well as a varied palette.
-Jane Shellenbarger