One of the many wonderful programs at Watershed is the “Artists Invite Series.”  During these sessions, an artist, or group of artists, usually past residents of Watershed, invites a number of other artists with whom they would like to share time and space in the studio.  It is not essential that the group of artists work in clay to be part of the Watershed Experience, all mediums, from painting to sculpture to photography, are welcome.  This blending of mediums and energies, creates a rare and special working environment in which new and exciting ideas can take hold and flourish.

A colorful space in the Summer Resident’s Studio.

For Session 4, Colorado artists Sonya PauKune and Chris Wanner, along with their two boys, invited a group of friends and colleagues, made up of ceramists, photographers, and sculptors,  to spend two weeks working together at Watershed.  The interesting group of individuals included fellow Colorado artists Karl Dukestein, Daniel Fonken, and Tamera Myer-Mams, Peter Arcidiacono and Jolea Arcidiacono, both from Texas, Skeffington Thomas, of New Jersey, and Amy Hauber (along with her best bud, pug dog Penney,) of New York, as well as session residents from Oregon, New York, Kansas and Pennsylvania.  This eclectic mix created a great vibe in the factory studios, as well as providing fun conversations around the house.

Skeff Thomas at work on a large funerary urn.

The theme of Session 4 was loosely based on the use of Frame and Form as it relates to these contemporary artists and educators.  This group of artists quickly got down to the business of making art, cranking out enough work to fill the soda kiln in the first week…with quite lovely results.  Then, after weekend trips to the beach and other local attractions, they still had enough energy left to go from one firing extreme,a labor intensive, two day, wood fire, to the other, the ceramist’s equivalent to instant gratification, a raku firing on the last evening.

Some of the results from a successful soda firing.

Having spent a great deal of their lives in cities or towns, many artists come to Watershed and notice that they become more connected to the natural world…they observe the change of the seasons, befriend the industious spiders in the factory studio, and catch glimpses of the local wildlife.  But, as for my own observations, I have noticed an increased awareness of the energy people give to a space.  Now that I have seen more than one group of session residents come and go, these subtle shifts seem even more apparent.  And, while as I develop a stronger bond within the community of Watershed, my dependence on this transient flow of energy is somewhat lessened, I still feel its effects on both my work and my life as a whole.

Session 4 resident Yasha Butler at work.