Sarah Pike Walter Gropius Master Artist Lecture

The Huntington Museum of Art welcomed artist Sarah Pike on March 7, 2025 for her Walter Gropius Master Artist Lecture. Pike spoke about her art during the free lecture. This is a live recording of that lecture.

An exhibit of work by Pike went on view at HMA on Dec. 14, 2024, and was on view through March 30, 2025. Pike conducted a workshop at HMA titled “Tessellation, Texture, and the Slab-built Form” from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Friday, March 7, through Sunday, March 9, 2025. In this three-day workshop, Pike demonstrated and lead students through her texture tool-making process and the components of her slab-built forms. She demonstrated the intricacies of carving clay stamps with defined detail with a focus on shapes that repeat and tesselate across the surface of the slab. Students learned how to stamp patterns into clay and then turn those slabs into a variety of functional forms.

About the Artist-
Sarah Pike is a full-time potter living and making functional slab-built wares in Fernie, BC, Canada, the traditional territory of the Ktunaxa. She studied ceramics at Alberta College of Art and Design, University of Colorado, and the University of Minnesota. Sarah is a proud member of the Canadian ceramic collection, Make & Do. Sarah teaches workshops about her slab building techniques worldwide and shows internationally with recent solo exhibitions at Akar Gallery in Iowa, Good Earth Gallery in Washington and Schaller Gallery in Michigan.

Sarah is very interested in making stamps and texture tools and pressing them into soft clay. Lately, she is obsessing over the ogee curve and how it tessellates across a form. Her natural habitat is her studio, but if she isn't making pots, she is probably out exploring the mountains around her home by ski or bike. She is generally thinking about snacks.

Sarah's pottery is inspired by many things, including the landscape around her home, the rich history of pottery, but also by antique tinware, textured metal, interesting fabric patterns, and the old things you might find in barns.