Residence VIII: A showcase of artists from New Harmony Clay Project featured at USI NHGCA

The University of Southern Indiana New Harmony Gallery of Contemporary Art (NHGCA) will host a group exhibition, Residence VIII, in partnership with New Harmony Clay Project, Saturday, April 27 through Saturday, June 1. The exhibition features ceramic works by recent residents of New Harmony Clay Project: Tom Belden, Katie Botterman, Audra Lynn Clayton, Christie Cooper, Gary Greenberg, Alex Lewis, Autumn McKay and Greg Van Dusseldorp. An opening reception will be held from 4 to 6 p.m. Saturday, April 27 at the Gallery and is open to the public at no charge. 

Works on display indicate the rich span of contemporary artistic approaches to working in ceramics today. The exhibit features life size sculptures alongside works embracing contrasting elements of abstraction and figuration. Residence VIII offers cutting-edge insight into the styles and techniques of contemporary artists and explores new concepts and frameworks for expanding the medium. 

Belden is currently retired from teaching, but he continues to produce his own art works and does workshops around the country in ceramic art and kiln construction. Belden acquired his Bachelor of Science in Art Education at the University of Wisconsin/Stout and Master of Fine Arts in Ceramics at Arizona State University. He taught drawing, painting, ceramics, art history, design and sculpture for 41 years at the university level. He taught at Arizona State University, Kentucky State University, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, Mesa Community College and Central Arizona College. Additionally, he was the Department Head at two of those institutions and Director of the Art Galleries at two others.  

Katie Botterman is a ceramic artist and instructor working in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Ohio University. Notable exhibitions include Rendered Fusion: Clay, Connection, Attention NCECA Annual 2024 at the Harnett Museum of Art in Richmond, Virginia, and ORIGIN, juried by Kensuke Yamada at Baltimore Clayworks, Baltimore, Maryland. Botterman currently works as a ceramics instructor in her hometown at the North Hills Art Center where she shares her love of clay with others while pursuing her own new works. 

Audra Lynn Clayton has been a practicing potter for over 20 years. She lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she is excited about functional work, sculpture and atmospheric firings. Her sculptural work explores people and their places. She is the Studio Arts Manager at the Pittsburgh Center for Arts and Media, where she finds great joy in facilitating opportunities for the artists there to thrive. 

Christie Cooper received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2011 at the Eskenazi School of Art, Architecture and Design at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. Cooper majored in ceramics and minored in art history. While at Indiana University she studied with Malcolm Mobutu Smith, Tim Mather and Christyl Boger. In addition to making and exhibiting work she has worked as a ceramics instructor since 2011. 

Gary “Greeny” Greenberg has been involved with ceramics for more than 52 years. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Northern Illinois University and a Master of Fine Arts from Arizona State, which has resulted in his current position as Assistant Professor Art/Ceramics and former department chair at Clarion University of Pennsylvania, for the last 30 years.  

Alex Lewis is currently based out of Columbus, Ohio. In 2021, Lewis received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Ceramics with a minor in art history from Otterbein University, Westerville, Ohio. He received his Master of Fine Arts in ceramics from Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, in 2023. He has exhibited in the United States and in Canada. 

Autumn McKay is a ceramic artist from Louisville, Kentucky. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Louisville and was selected to be a part of the first cohort of the Hadley Creatives grant program in Louisville, Kentucky. She received a grant from the Great Meadows Foundation that assisted her travels to Vallauris, France, where she was a resident artist at A.I.R Vallauris for three months. After returning to the United States, McKay accepted a short residency at HOBA house in the Portland neighborhood of Louisville. In 2021, she was accepted into the post-baccalaureate program at Indiana University Southeast.  

Greg Van Dusseldorp is a studio artist that works in 2D & 3D formats, with clay and paint being the primary materials. He received his Bachelor of Arts in art from Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, Iowa. Greg received his Master of Arts and Master of Fine Arts in Ceramics/Drawing at the University of Iowa’s School of Art and Art History. He studied ceramics under the guidance of Chuck Hindes, Clary Illian and Bunny McBride. Greg has been a resident artist at the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts, Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts and Red Lodge Clay Center. He has taught ceramics as a Visiting Professor at Kent State University for Kirk Mangus and as an adjunct at The University of Iowa’s School of Art & Art History. He was also an Assistant Professor of Art at Iowa Wesleyan College. Greg exhibits nationally and lives in Iowa City, Iowa.  

The NHCP is an artist residency and educational center located at the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Ceramic Studio in historic New Harmony. NHCP fosters an environment that supports the investigation of new ideas and work in the ceramic arts. It is an organization under the New Harmony Artist Guild, a non-profit 501(c)3, that serves as an incubator for nurturing the arts. NHCP is a rural residency program, supported by the Efroymson Family Fund, Lenny and Anne Dowhie Trusts and Robert Lee Blaffer Foundation. Its goal is to encourage emerging and professional visual artists/educators in ceramics by giving them quiet space and the time to develop a new body of work. 

The NHGCA promotes discourse about and access to contemporary art in the southern Indiana region and is an outreach partner of USI. The gallery is located at 506 Main Street in New Harmony, Indiana. Regular hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. For more information, visit the NHGCA website or call 812-682-3156.   

This exhibition is made possible in part by the Arts Council of Southwestern Indiana and the Indiana Arts Commission, which receives support from the State of Indiana and the National Endowment for the Arts.