| Artist's Biography Logan M. Johnson |
| I received my first intro to ceramics in Jr. High like a lot of people. However, my interests at the time were focused on the performing arts as a dancer. That was no problem for my family as long as I had some way to support myself once I became an adult. Art has always been an integral part of my life and I always searched to find "my medium" of expression. Over the years I've tried many different ways to fulfill my search for "the right" medium for me. A work related accident left me partially disabled and at age 31 I was forced to make a change and try to figure out what I was going to with the rest of my life. My Labor and Industries vocational insurance would pay for me to be retrained but the question was, in what? The only thing that came to mind and that wouldn't go away was ceramics. At first I intended only to do murals on back-splashes using overglazes on commercial tiles and to work with interior decorators and designers. Learning to throw was an after thought related to my retraining. It was something I could try in class while focusing on glazing tiles. That was all it took. After about a month of throwing, my first time since Jr. High school, I was hooked and I knew this was my medium! Creating pottery made my soul sing! All together I spent about 4 ½ years at the college, the first year as a student after which I became the Ceramic Department's studio technician. I was learning all of the time and even took advantage of the college's education program that allowed me to attend a Silvia Granitelli workshop at the famed Archie Bray Foundation in the summer of 2002. Working as the studio technician allowed me to continue learning and I soon reached the point were I felt that I had learned about all that my instructor could or would teach me. I had been doing fairly well selling at my work at craft fairs, local craft galleries, and by doing some commissioned work as a part time potter. I reinvested all of my earnings and my personal studio had evolved to be the envy of many a potter. I felt that I was ready to go full time with my pottery! Since leaving the college I have continued my ceramics education in a less formal manner. I joined ClayArt, an on line forum for potters, and have also joined the Potters Council of the American Ceramic Society. I was also fortunate to attend a workshop given by Robert Piepenburg at the end of 2003 to further my study of raku firing techniques. I will be attending more workshops in the future including one be given this coming summer by Vince Pitelka that I am really looking forward to. Over the last four years I have also become a fixture of the Evergreen State Fair in Monroe Washington where I demonstrate daily for two weeks on the different aspects of pottery making. I also give private and semi-private instruction in throwing, hand building, glazes and firing in my private studio. Currently my work is either fired using raku or cone six oxidation. I will be adding cone ten reduction firings as soon as my husband builds a shed to protect my new gas kiln from the elements. My studio currently has two electric wheels, a kick wheel (with an electric starting motor), a slab roller, a pug mill, three electric kilns, three raku kilns, a full glaze making facility, a hand building area, a spray booth and one very sweet, clay stealing, rottweiler named Angel. My husband, Dennis, and I have been married for the last 20 years. The three of us, Dennis, Angel and I, have also been given the honor of being allowed to share our home with, and to serve, a white fluffy terror (our cat) named "Smuge" who doesn't know that it's not okay for a ten pound cat to beat up on a 100 pound rottweiler. I hope you enjoy my website. Please feel free to contact me with any questions you might have. Thanks for visiting and drop in again soon! |
| Angel at 2 months old in 1996 |