ERNEST MILLER
Bio:
I am a ceramic artist working in Minneapolis, MN. My ceramics career has been mostly built through showing work in various regional and national art fairs including the Uptown Art Fair in Minneapolis and the Smithsonian Craft Show in Washington, DC. You can find a selection of my work at The Grand Hand Gallery in St. Paul, MN and Schaller Gallery in Saint Joseph, MI. I credit a formal education as an important part of my early personal growth as an artist.
Educators and mentors played a role in exposure to ideas, resources, and processes that continue to be used today in the creation of my work. I received an Associates degree from Olney Central College in Olney, IL and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, IL. I can be found at local art centers sharing ceramic techniques and experience through teaching classes at Fired Up Studios in Golden Valley, Minnesota and the Minnetonka Center for the Arts in Wayzata, Minnesota.
Contact:
Artist Statement:
My pottery is inspired by the architecture and machinery found in the rural Midwestern landscape. Weathered paint and surface deterioration reveal a warmth earned through time and use presenting a record of their past. These interests are drawn upon and interpreted into my ceramic work through vessel form and surface.
The pieces chosen for exhibition are translations of visual elements from my personal interests. The plate pattern started as a close up of an oil pumpjack. I was thinking about the cultural acceptance of these objects pumping oil and society’s reliance on fossil fuels. The simple patterns on the plate become foreground and background depending on the viewer’s perception.
Ernest Miller, Plate, 2020, stoneware, slip, and glaze, 19x19x2.5 inches, collection of the artist
The box and vase include elements from grain silos and barns. Negative space is cut into a lid handle or foot to invite the viewer to look through and around the object.
Ernest Miller, Vase, 2020, stoneware, slip, and glaze, 12.5x8.5x5 inches, collection of the artist
