About Us

A ceramic artist who most recently lived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Joan Brown frequently uses porcelain, a material that helps her represent purity, delicacy, and fragility. This clay body allows her to mimic soft and supple flesh by creating highly detailed manipulations of surface that force the material to become something it is not. By stretching the limits of porcelain’s physical properties, Joan’s work symbolizes many of the complexities of femininity, as defined by both herself and by society. At HCCC, she hopes to expand upon this body of work and continue to develop visual representations of the injustices women face in contemporary cultures. In addition to cultivating her own personal growth, she hopes to be a part of and assist in fostering a community-oriented studio environment that is positive and welcoming.

Joan received her BFA, concentrating in ceramics, from the University of the Arts in 2013 and her MFA, concentrating in ceramics, from Bowling Green University in 2018. In 2020, she completed a two-year residency at University of the Arts, during which time she expounded on her thesis exhibition, Seductive Constrictions. Joan has shown work in Japan, New Orleans, Washington, Ohio and Pennsylvania, including a solo show in 2019, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Learn more about Brown’s work at www.joanclarebrown.com.

Utilizing material and process, Naomi Peterson creates contexts between objects to better understand and define the connections between seemingly disparate things. Integrating both analog and digital methods such as hand building, laser cutting, knitting, 3D printing, and felting, Peterson explores what craft means in the digital age. Her handcrafted, ornate pedestals represent the gravity of a perceived circumstance, such as making a promise. Trust, like a ceramic object, can be broken as well as repaired, though the result will most certainly be altered. Through these contexts, she examines her own experiences and observations in building relationships facilitated by objects and rituals. While in residence at HCCC, Peterson plans to expand on these investigations into subject-object relationships through bodies of work composed of functional and participatory elements.

Peterson received her MFA in ceramics at the University of North Texas in 2021 and her BFA in ceramics at the University of Wyoming in 2017. She was a Post-baccalaureate in ceramics at the University of Wyoming for the 2017 – 2018 academic year and participated in the annual, short-term, Neltje artist-in-residence program in 2018. Peterson has exhibited nationally; recently, her work was on display at Gandee Gallery in Fabius, New York, as part of the 2021 National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA) Gallery Expo.  In November of 2021, she will participate in a group exhibition, titled Women, Art, and Technology, at the Fort Worth Community Arts Center, curated by Eliza Au. 

To learn more about Peterson’s work, visit https://www.naomipeterson.com.

Abbie Preston Edmonson is an object maker. She is continually experimenting with ways to evoke a painterly surface on a three-dimensional object. Holding the tension between form and surface, Abbie’s ceramic pieces become a spontaneous layering process, with a nod to Abstract Expressionism, by exploring intuitive mark-making and gestural brushes of color. During her time at HCCC, Abbie will cultivate a new sculptural body of work exploring the theme of mental illness, focusing on narratives depicting darkness and isolation in hopes of inspiring open dialogue.

Abbie attended Valdosta State University in Georgia, graduating in 2009 with a BFA in ceramics and a secondary in painting. She was an artist-in-residence at Mudfire Studios in Atlanta from 2010-2011. Abbie is the owner and creator of Box Sparrow Studio, a Houston-based brand creating functional ceramics out of Hardy and Nance Street Studios. Recently, she was selected to participate in two celebrity design collaborations through Etsy. You can find her work locally at Forth and Nomad, The Flora Culture, and Manready Mercantile. Abbie is currently serving as vice president on the ClayHouston board and teaches wheel-throwing at Third Coast Clay. To learn more about her work, visit www.boxsparrowstudio.com.