Treading Lightly: Walking the Talk

March 25-29, 2025

Our March 2025 show is one of a handful of Featured Exhibitions at the 2025 NCECA conference in Salt Lake City! The Pots On Wheels potters will present an exhibition of the work of ceramic artists from the US and internationally, whose practice and artwork focuses on sustainability and care for the environment. We’ve gathered a broad swath of makers whose novel approaches to studio practice center on the environment. We aim to provide an educational opportunity for other artists as well as the broader community. Treading Lightly brings together 12-20 ceramic artists who are taking steps towards sustainability in their practice as well as evoking environmental themes in their work. In keeping with the 2025 NCECA theme of Formation, our project focuses attention on ways of making, sustainably. The exhibition will be accompanied by community programming and outreach, including (hopefully) firing rocket kilns!

Pots On Wheels — POW! — is a mobile clay education and exhibition space, opening new doors of creative experience to communities and organizations.

OUTREACH

The POW! truck allows established and emerging ceramic artists to share their knowledge and perspectives with audiences of all ages and backgrounds outside the conventional educational or studio settings.

ENGAGEMENT

By encouraging participants to actively participate in the creation of hand-made objects, POW! cultivates each individual'sability to make something useful and beautiful with their hands, and their understanding of how that can impact the experiences of others.

AWARENESS

The gallery space within in the POW! truck serves as a showcase for the diverse and dynamic range of functional handmade ceramics currently being created by artists from around the country (and sometimes even by program participants!).

Hands-on creativity

Most POW! event participants have never had the chance to make something with clay. For others, it rekindles a joy they may not have had the opportunity to pursue in decades. You would be surprised by what you are capable of!

Connecting people & ideas

Our Make-A-Cup, Take-A-Cup exchange has given a first-hand introduction to creating an original clay object to thousands of participants! Folks can decorate (and sometimes even hand-make) a cup that will be part of a future POW! event, while taking home a cup that someone else decorated at a previous one.