GLENDA KLEINSASSER
Black Vase
Orb & Vase & Globe
Two Bottles
Green Vase
Raku Pot I
Raku Pot II
Bottle, Vase, Globe
Multi Colored Bowl
Cream Bowl and Vase
Vase
Artist Statement:
Glenda Kleinsasser was born and raised in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. She attended Augustana College and took her first class in making pottery while living in State College, Pennsylvania. She also attended pottery classes at the Opportunity School in Denver, Colorado and then moved to Minnesota where she continued her pottery education at the College of St. Benedict‘s. It was here, studying with Bill Smith, that she developed her love of porcelain and bottle and vase forms.
After a long hiatus, it was not until 1994 that she would begin work in clay again, studying with Sandy Cryer at Pikes Peak Community College in Colorado Springs. This lead to her affiliation with the Colorado Springs Senior Center, where she was a long time volunteer eventually hired to mix glazes, fire kilns, and teach classes. While there she was instrumental in starting their Open Studio program.
Later, she and four other potters, would establish The Pottery Co-op in Colorado Springs. She was a member of their board of directors during the time she spent there. In this time period, she took a workshop with Stephen Jepson which lead to a month long internship with him at the World Pottery Institute in Florida.
In 1999, she became a member of Commonwheel Artists Cooperative in Manitou Springs and until recently was a member of their board of directors and is currently a very active artist member.
She was an original member of the Clay Center in Colorado Springs and became affiliated again in 2009, along with becoming a Studio Artist at the Business of Arts Center in Manitou Springs.
Since 1994, she has taken numerous pottery classes, demonstration workshops and hands-on workshops from local, national and international potters to further develop her ceramic skills and has shown her work in many pottery shows and exhibitions.
She’s a Charter Member of the Potter’s Council and has been a member of the National Council for Education in the Ceramic Arts since 1998.
Glenda is an avid collector of books on pottery making, potter’s and pottery. She also has an extensive collection of pottery magazines, videos and DVDs.
Her current ceramic art is primarily wheel thrown bottles and classic vase forms in both porcelain and stoneware in high fire gas reduction, although she does produce some functional work, as well as handbuilt slab work and extruded forms. She has also produced work in raku, salt bisque, pit firing, sagger firing, electric oxidation, high fire salt & soda, wood firing and crystalline firing.