Paloma Clay Studio, San Miguel De Allende, Mexico
Workshop Instructors
2026
Richard Burkett - Throw It! Better & Beyond
Richard Burkett has worked in clay for over 50 years, and exhibited his work internationally. He taught all aspects of ceramics as a professor at San Diego State University for 30 of those years. After working as a full-time studio potter for 10 years, he received his MFA from Indiana University, then taught at the University of Wisconsin-Madison for three years before moving to SDSU. His clay work has alternated between functional pottery and sculptural forms throughout his career, with a focus on soda and salt glazed pottery in porcelain and stoneware. Since retiring from teaching at SDSU he has focused again on primarily being a studio potter. He has given workshops and lectures in Wales, Turkey, Ireland, Korea, Ecuador, Canada, Sweden, Finland, at universities across the U.S, and at Penland and Arrowmont craft schools. He is the author of HyperGlaze ceramics software, Ceramics: a Potter’s Handbook 6th edition, and Porcelain Masters (Lark Books) and Mythical Figures and Mucawas (co-authored with Joe Molinaro). He was endowed with NCECA’s highest award, Honorary Member status, in 2023.For more information about Richard go to: http://richardburkett.com/
Linda Christianson - What If? Ideas and Making
Linda Christianson is an independent studio potter who lives and works in rural Minnesota. Working with high-fire clays, she fires her work in a two-chambered wood kiln. She studied at Hamline University (St Paul, Minnesota), and the Banff Centre School of Fine Arts (Banff, Alberta, Canada). She exhibits nationally and internationally, including one-person exhibits in London and St. Louis. Her pieces are in numerous public and private collections, including the American Museum of Ceramic Art and the Glenboe Museum. An itinerate educator, Linda has taught at colleges and universities, including Carleton College, the University of Georgia – Athens, and the Hartford Art School. She received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the McKnight Foundation. One of her goals is to make a better cup each day. For more information about Linda and her work go to https//www.christiansonpottery.com
Tony Clennell -Living on the Edge? Si!
Tony Clennell, MFA, RCA is a second-generation potter who has taught workshops in Canada, the US, Japan, China, Korea, Wales, Italy and Portugal. He has a Master of Fine Arts from Utah State University and is a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. Tony has written articles for an assortment of ceramic journals including Fusion, Contact, Ceramics Monthly, Pottery Making Illustrated, Clay Times, and Studio Potter, He has exhibited in museums and collections in North America, Europe, and Asia. He is the author of Stuck in the Mud and a celebrated blogger. smokieclennell.blogspot.com
Sunshine Cobb: Hand Building Explorations
Sunshine Cobb, (pronouns she/they) As a full-time studio artist living in Helena, Montana, she specializes in handmade functional pottery. She frequently travels she country as an invited lecturing and demonstrating artist. They are considered an important contemporary functional potter, hailed in both academic and commercial circles, and is consistently featured in art exhibitions throughout the country. With a strong social media following and online media presence, she represents an innovator in online business models in the ever-changing ceramics field and a leading advocate for functional art in modern living. She devotes time and effort into working with artists, seeking mentorship, to develop their practice and art. She has also authored two books “Mastering Hand Building” and “A Beginners Guide to Hand Building” by Voyager Press. You can discover more about Sunshine and her work at https://www.sunshinecobb.com/
Alessandro Gallo: Strange Encounters: Narratives in Clay
Alessandro Gallo represents the silent life happening around him using human/animal hybrids. He uses the animal head as an expressive tool, something between a mask and a caricature that exaggerates inner features. Alessandro combines these heads with the silent language of our body and the cultural codes of fashion in order to portray specific individuals, the subcultures they belong to, and ultimately, the common habitat we all share.
Alessandro Gallo was born in 1974 in Genoa, Italy, and is now based in Helena, Montana, in the United States. After studying Law at the University of Genoa, Gallo moved to London, where he studied at Saint Martin’s College of Art and at Chelsea School of Art and Design. Alessandro has shown internationally, and his work was in the 54th Venice Biennale in 2011. In 2012, he was awarded a first-place grant from the Virginia A. Groot Foundation. In 2014 and 2016, he had solo shows at the Jonathan Levine Gallery in New York. In 2018, Alessandro was selected as a Demonstrating Artist for NCECA (National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts).
Claudia Olds Goldie: The Expressive Figure
Claudia Olds Goldie is a mid-career studio artist and educator. She presently teaches figurative ceramics at Harvard Ceramics and teaches workshops across the US and in Mexico.
Olds Goldie is a Mass Cultural Council finalist. She received a Kiln God Residency from Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts, a residency fellowship from the Vermont Studio Center, a nomination for a Boston Foundation Brother Thomas fellowship, and a 2025 Best Sculpture award from the State of Clay National Juried exhibition. She has shown nationally in shows such as the NCECA Biennial in Houston, SOFA Chicago, and “Contemporary Figurative Sculpture” at Santa Fe Clay Gallery.
Her work has been published in The Figure in Clay by Cristina Cordova, 500 Figures in Clay, 500 Figures in Clay Vol. 2 by Nan Smith, Sculpting Clay, and Low Fire: Other Ways to Work in Clay, both by Leon Nigrosh, and in Ceramics Monthly, Clay Times, and American Craft magazines.
To see videos of Claudia speaking about her work go to:
Video: In the Studio with Claudia Olds Goldie
Video: Arts and Ideas with Sue Swinand, A Mother Daughter Journey
Sarah Pike - Celebrating Slab Built Tableware
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 collective, 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.
You can fine more about Sarah at www.sarahpikepottery.com/
Deborah Schwartzkopf - Cross-Pollination
Deb Schwartzkopf is a Seattle-based ceramic artist, educator, and community builder with over 20 years of experience working in clay. She earned her MFA from Penn State and has taught at universities and art centers across the U.S. and internationally. Her adventurous career includes residencies from Montana to Germany and China.As a studio artist, Deb’s work focuses on creating vibrant, purposeful tableware that invites daily use and connection. She approaches clay with both practiced skill and playful intuition, drawing inspiration from the subtle details of the natural world—bird colors, shifting shadows, and the tactile experience of holding a well-crafted cup or pitcher. For Deb, making pottery is a dialogue between intention and exploration, form and function.Passionate about fostering community, Deb founded Rat City Studios in 2013 and Rain City Clay in 2022, spaces dedicated to creative collaboration and experiential learning. She believes that a thriving studio practice is nourished by connection—whether through teaching workshops, mentoring artists, or sharing life with friends, family, and neighbors. Her work is collected nationally, widely published, and she was honored as Ceramics Monthly’s Ceramic Artist of the Year in 2019.Busy like a bee, Deb’s life buzzes with making, teaching, mentoring, and nurturing tomatoes in her little greenhouse–all fueling the energy and joy that infuse her pottery.
You can see more about Deb at https://debspottery.com/ or follow her on Instagram at @debspottery
Joe Wilkinson - Clay in Context
Joe Wilkinson is a Seattle-based ceramic sculptor whose work explores the tension between structure and chaos, drawing inspiration from patterns in nature—from river systems and neural networks to cosmic forces. He received his BFA from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and his MFA from Michigan State University. Joe first discovered his love of clay in 2008 while studying at Colorado Mountain College.Since moving to Seattle in 2016, he has been part of vibrant creative communities at Pottery Northwest, Seward Park Clay Studio, and Rat City Studios, where he now lives and works with his partner, studio potter Deborah Schwartzkopf. In addition to his ceramic work, Joe is a skilled metal fabricator, crafting custom staircases and fixtures.Joe’s sculptures often grow off the table or wall, revealing traces of movement and transformation. He works intuitively with coils and slabs, responding to the clay as forms evolve. Drawing from cosmology, biology, and geology, his work invites viewers into a state of curiosity—a space where patterns emerge, shift, and open up new possibilities.
You can see more about Joe at https://joewilkinsonstudio.com/ and follow him on Instagram at @wilkinsonsculpture