Featured Artists Exhibition Reception

Trees: Roots, Leaves, and Limbs

“North Carolina is home to over 400 native tree species, as well as many invasive varieties. Most days we don’t give the trees in our life much notice.  We reap many benefits of the trees around us.  They provide shade, stabilize soil, act as marvelous sponges absorbing heavy rainfall, and then slowly releasing it back into the soil, not to mention they sequester CO2, and help generate the oxygen we need to live!

This exhibition highlights their aesthetic beauty, expressed in shape, texture and tone.  The collection has come together naturally over years.  I have a love for our tall friends, and my lens is often drawn to them on whole or part.

I hope you come away from this exhibition with a new appreciation for our woody neighbors.  As you step outside your home, stop and look around.  How many trees are your neighbors? Take a moment to get to know them, their shapes, textures, and colors and remember to say thank you for all of the things they do for us.” – Chip

Fire & Form

Highlighting the transformative heat processes behind glass and clay

“This show explores how fire transforms raw materials into enduring art.  Every piece I create begins with raw elements—earth, sand, and fire. In my studio, the kiln is both a container and a storyteller, transforming modest clay into ceramic pieces with rich textures, and fusing glass into luminous panels and artistic pieces that capture and bend the light. This exhibit is a celebration of that transformation—of heat’s power to shape, soften, and reveal beauty in unexpected ways.

Working in both mediums allows me to explore the differences in both: the grounded weight of the clay right beside the delicate translucence of the glass. Each work invites you to look closer, to see the subtle marks of the process, and to feel the energy of its making. I hope you’ll step into this space with curiosity, and leave with a sense of wonder for what can emerge when earth and light meet in the fire.” – Tom