Mitchell County is a county located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 14,903. Its county seat is Bakersville.
The Penland School of Craft is an Arts and Crafts educational center located in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Penland, North Carolina in the Snow Creek Township near Spruce Pine, about 50 miles from Asheville.
Studio pottery is pottery made by professional and amateur artists or artisans working alone or in small groups, making unique items or short runs. Typically, all stages of manufacture are carried out by the artists themselves. Studio pottery includes functional wares such as tableware and cookware, and non-functional wares such as sculpture, with vases and bowls covering the middle ground, often being used only for display. Studio potters can be referred to as ceramic artists, ceramists, ceramicists or as an artist who uses clay as a medium.
North Carolina Highway 226 (NC 226) is a primary state highway in the U.S. state of North Carolina. Traveling north–south through Western North Carolina, it connects the cities and towns of Grover, Shelby, Marion, Spruce Pine and Bakersville. It also a scenic byway in the South Mountains area and connects with the summer colony of Little Switzerland, via NC 226A.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to crafts:
Southern Highland Craft Guild is a guild craft organization that has partnered with the National Park Service for over seventy years. The Guild represents over 800 craftspeople in 293 counties of 9 southeastern states. It operates four retail craft shops and two annual craft expositions which represent the Guild members' work. These expositions occur in July and October and have taken place in the Appalachian mountain region since 1948.
The Mint Museum, also referred to as The Mint Museums, is a cultural institution comprising two museums, located in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Mint Museum Randolph and Mint Museum Uptown, together these two locations have hundreds of collections showcasing art and design from around the globe.
Robert Brady is an American modernist sculptor who works in ceramics and wood. Born in Reno, Nevada, he has made his home in the San Francisco Bay Area for many decades. Brady is a multi-faceted artist who works in ceramics, wood, painting, and illustration, and is best known for his abstract figurative sculptures. Brady came out of the California Clay movement, and the Bay Area Arts scene of the 1950s and 1960s, which includes artists such as Peter Voulkos, Viola Frey, Stephen de Staebler, and Robert Arneson who was his mentor and teacher in college.
Mark Hewitt is an English-born studio potter living in the small town of Pittsboro, North Carolina outside of Chapel Hill, North Carolina. In 2015 he received a United States Artist Fellowship, for contributions to the creative landscape and arts ecosystems of the country. He was a finalist for the 2015 Balvenie Rare Craft Fellowship Award, for contributions to the maintenance and revival of traditional or rare craft techniques. In 2014 he was awarded a Voulkos Fellowship at the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts in Helena, Montana, for outstanding contributions to the ceramic arts.
Maija (Majlis) Grotell was an influential Finnish-American ceramic artist and educator. She is often described as the "Mother of American Ceramics."
Richard Ritter is an American studio glass artist who lives in North Carolina.
Gary Lee Noffke is an American artist and metalsmith. Known for versatility and originality, he is a blacksmith, coppersmith, silversmith, goldsmith, and toolmaker. He has produced gold and silver hollowware, cutlery, jewelry, and forged steelware. Noffke is noted for his technical versatility, his pioneering research into hot forging, the introduction of new alloys, and his ability to both build on and challenge traditional techniques. He has been called the metalsmith's metalsmith, a pacesetter, and a maverick. He is also an educator who has mentored an entire generation of metalsmiths. He has received numerous awards and honors. He has exhibited internationally, and his work is represented in collections around the world.
Cedar Creek Gallery is a fine craft gallery located in Creedmoor, North Carolina. Craftspeople work alongside each other, fire wood and gas fired kilns, blow glass and make a living as artists onsite. Cedar Creek Pottery and Gallery was started in 1968 by Sid and Pat Oakley on what used to be an old tobacco field. The Gallery has grown from one building into over ten since then. The grounds are well maintained with many plants, flowers and trees.
Charles Counts (1934–2000) was an American potter, designer, textile artist, quilter, teacher, writer, and activist. Counts worked to preserve the art forms of his native Appalachia, and later moved to Nigeria where he taught until his death.
Wendy Maruyama is an American visual artist, furniture maker, and educator from California. She was born in La Junta, Colorado.
Karl Martz was an American studio potter, ceramic artist, and teacher whose work achieved national and international recognition.
Lisa Kay Orr is an American potter and a teacher of ceramics. Orr has work in both public and private collections, and shows her work nationally as well as internationally. Orr's work can be seen in the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco and in Korea in the collection of the WOCEF.
Cynthia Bringle was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and has lived and worked in Penland, North Carolina since 1970. She is a potter and teaches at the Penland School of Crafts, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, and John C. Campbell Folk School.
Michael Sherrill is an American ceramist and sculptor. Primarily self-taught, Sherrill's early work in the 1970s and 1980s focused on creating functional pieces in clay before turning to sculptural artwork in porcelain and metal in the 1990s. Sherrill lives and works in Bat Cave, North Carolina.
Michael John Simon was an American ceramic artist. He is known primarily for his salt-fired stoneware works combining distinct forms with wax-resist animal or natural motifs.
