{"id":24521,"date":"2019-08-21T18:39:02","date_gmt":"2019-08-21T22:39:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=24521"},"modified":"2019-08-29T16:56:41","modified_gmt":"2019-08-29T20:56:41","slug":"view-from-the-pines-celebrates-40-years-of-artistic-excellence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/view-from-the-pines-celebrates-40-years-of-artistic-excellence\/","title":{"rendered":"View from the Pines celebrates 40 years of artistic excellence"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

After 40 years, members of the Pine Tree Potters Guild\nare taking time to enjoy the View.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The celebrated ceramic artists, however, are not covering\nup their wheels and resting on their laurels, but using this view as a\nguidepost for the next four decades of artistic creativity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last Saturday, the Pine Tree Potters Guild officially\nmarked their fortieth anniversary with the opening of View from the Pines, a\njuried exhibition of new ceramic works now on through September 28 at the\nAurora Cultural Centre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bringing together new works from more than 40 guild\nmembers, the pieces have been curated by jurors Janna Hiemstra, Executive\nDirector of Craft Ontario, and Angelo di Petta, an internationally-renowned\nceramic artist, who curated the exhibition from more than 90 submissions based\non craftsmanship, excellence of design and originality. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWith a theme such as View from the Pines, you could\napproach your work from an environmental standpoint, as someone who loves\nnature, as someone with a sense of social justice, all with the idea of looking\ndown on things and still having a clear vision of what\u2019s around you,\u201d explains\nTeresa Dunlop, a Guild member of 18 years, who co-organized the exhibition. \u201cWe\nhave pieces that are simply beautiful and useful, we have pieces with rich\nnarratives that really tell strong stories, and there are also pieces that are\nraising issues of social justice, including one called \u2018The Wall\u2019 which is a\nreflection of the proposed wall between Mexico and the United States. It is\njust work that makes you stop and say, \u2018Ah!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ms. Dunlop has three of her own pieces in the exhibition,\nceramics that are wood-fired and touched by flame and ash. This, she says,\nseems to \u201cadd another layer of meaning\u201d to her objects, including a set of\nplates entitled \u201cTable for Two\u201d, a sculpture \u201cTectonic Shift\u201d and an object\nwith large cross-pieces called \u201cLove Handles.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She first tried her hand at pottery nearly 20 years ago.\nDuring classes, she fell in love with both the material and the creative\nprocess and began to pursue the medium seriously. One of her first stops was\nthe Pine Tree Potters Guild. Since her first involvement, she has served as the\norganization\u2019s studio heat, vice president, president and past-president, and\ncurrently serves on the executive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was so inspired by being a member of Pine Tree that\nwhen I retired from teaching I decided to go back to school and study craft and\ndesign at Sheridan College,\u201d she says, \u201cI graduated from there in 2014 and this\nis all as a result of being a part of Pine Tree, and I\u2019ve started a second career\nas a ceramic artist.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What really inspired her while getting her hands dirty\nwith clay was the ability of the earthy material to make things that were both\nbeautiful and useful. She found a passion for making things that were\nfunctional and also served to enhance and beautify the home \u2013 improving a\nperson\u2019s quality of life in the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cClay gives you that possibility,\u201d she says of melding\nform and function. \u201cIt\u2019s great if you want to make functional things, but it is\nso wonderful because the material is so plastic, able to accept marks, be\nmanipulated, and it is a medium that has such history and variety of use,\nvariety of processes, that you can be excited by it for the rest of your life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This excitement has a trickle-down affect on the viewer\nand consumer. An exhibition like View from the Pines, she says, is intended to\n\u201cexcite, raise questions and make people feel uplifted.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the goal with this show, to spread the word about\nclay within the larger community of York Region,\u201d she says. \u201cHaving a show like\nthis just affirms the importance of art and art is part of a vibrant society.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enhancing the exhibition have been the keen eyes of the\njurors who were able to not only select the best of the best, but also suggest\nnext steps to burgeoning artists just coming up through the Guild, many of whom\nare represented in the anniversary show.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe work is really accessible and there is something for\neverybody because it is quite a diverse collection,\u201d says Ms. Dunlop. \u201cThe 43\npieces really cover the gamut of processes and topics, and there is a variety\nthat will engage everyone. Also, to celebrate our anniversary, we challenged\nour members to create garden art, so we have 11 garden totems \u2013 that is,\nstacked items \u2013 ranging in height from three to six feet, made in clay. They\nare just delightful, and include a series of teacups and another that is a\nbeautiful collection by members Cristel von Richter and Sheena Griffiths, which\nis a beautiful scene of a garden with all kinds of birds.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These \u201cwhimsical totems\u201d are also available for sale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is a great Guild and we offer classes to the public\nand workshops, so somebody who might want to find a way to do something with\ntheir hands, they need some kind of a hobby or release, this is another way of\nintroducing them to Pine Tree Potters and also to the history of the guild\nwithin the community,\u201d says Ms. Dunlop. \u201cThere is a lot of great stuff\nhappening within Aurora and York Region and going to this show will help you\nlearn a little bit more about the community you live in.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

View from the Pines, the 40th<\/sup> Anniversary\n& Juried Exhibition of New Ceramic Works from the Pine Tree Potters Guild,\nruns at the Aurora Cultural Centre through September 28. Gallery hours are\nMonday \u2013 Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. This Saturday, August 24, artist Sheena\nGriffiths will hold a wheel-throwing demonstration from 1 \u2013 4 p.m. <\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aurora’s Pine Tree Potters Guild celebrates milestone 40th anniversary with juried art show now on at the Aurora Cultural Centre. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":24514,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-and-culture","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2019-08-22-01.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-6nv","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-10 07:35:30","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24521\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}