ALUMNI STORIES - ERIN CLEMMONS
NOTES FROM RECENT ALUMNUS, ERIN SOWER CLEMONS - CASTLE ROCK, CO.
As a fresh Union Art Department graduate, I’m just beginning my journey in the arts. In May 2016 I received my BA in Art with a concentration in ceramics. In July 2016 my husband and I moved to Castle Rock, Colorado where Zack began teaching Latin and we prepared for the birth of our first child, Eleanor. Shortly after moving I began making jewelry as a creative outlet, but I knew that I needed to get my hands back in clay. I bought a wheel and pieced together a home studio in our basement. At the end of October, shortly after I’d thrown the last plate for a commissioned eight-piece dinnerware set, I went into labor, and Eleanor arrived the next day. Even as I savored the first weeks of Eleanor’s life, I worked to keep my artistic inertia moving forward, firing work and selling at art shows.
Learning to both care well for Eleanor and pursue a creative life is a process, but process is one of my favorite themes. In these past few months I have taught wheel-throwing classes at a local middle school and I instruct a weekly ceramic club. On the business side of things, I am now focusing on online sales (www.erinclemmons.com) and commission work.
Erin & Eleanor
At Union I was captivated with material and by the ways in which we interact daily with the materials the earth gives us. This fascination carries into my life as a homemaker, as I understand practically the importance of the spaces we inhabit, the wares we use, and how these shape our daily life.
I’m motivated by the challenge of modeling a sincere and creative way of life for Eleanor. At weeks old Eleanor would stare at paintings Zack and I hung on our walls. By four months old she was a member of the Denver Art Museum and had visited three times. As a family we experience the beauty of liturgy each Sunday, and we have connected with people who are working to see widespread revitalization of the Christian imagination, particularly through the visual arts.
My work as an artist--especially working with clay--informs and enriches each area of homelife and community life, and these in turn inform and enrich my art.
Here are some examples of Erin's work:
