StillFire Pottery: Whidbey artist crafts nature-inspired elegance

By PATRICIA GUTHRIE

Special to The Record

The sea, the mountains, the forest — the essence of the Pacific Northwest — gleams from the shiny porcelain pottery of Carol Ann Bauer. So do the crimson bluffs and subtle shades of the Southwest.

A ceramic artist of plates, bowls, cups, vases and other functional wares, Bauer incorporates colors of her surroundings from the many places she’s lived, worked and sold pottery over the past 45 years.

“Water and nature have always been part of my work,” Bauer said. “A beautiful line or form and line detail have always caught my eye.”

Bauer and husband Howard Hamsa work from their StillFire home studio in Freeland. Supplies, tools and finished pieces spill from an outdoor workspace into the kitchen and living room. In warmer weather, Bauer moves her pottery wheel outside, surrounded by towering trees, gardens and a lush ravine.

Bauer is the main artist of the duo, while her husband, a former clinical psychologist, manages the business that’s supported their family, including two grown sons.

Hamsa also helps with the nonstop physical labor demanded by ceramics — hefting clay and buckets of minerals, mixing glazes and moving hundreds of fragile pieces in and out of the backyard kiln. (Hamsa also makes long, slim table vases that are popular sellers.)

“He’s indispensable,” Bauer said. With a laugh, she added, “His career skills actually come in handy when dealing with the public or gallery owners.”

Whidbey Island has been the couple’s home base since 1995, a place they can now enjoy in all its seasons since deciding to stop “living like gypsies” two years ago.

For decades they drove the circuit of 18 to 20 large craft markets and art shows around the country where repeat buyers added to their collections every year.

Alan and Deb Bice’s daughters were in elementary school when the Issaquah couple first visited Carol Ann and Howard’s booth at the Salmon Days Festival. The girls each picked out a bowl that year. Now, those bowls are heading off to college with them.

“Over the years, we have acquired StillFire plates, mugs, bowls, serving platters, and vases,” Deb Bice wrote in an email. “Some are proudly displayed year-round, such as a large bowl holding fruit on our counter, and a vase which is exquisite with or without flowers.

“StillFire pottery that we use daily, including our cherished bowls and plates, look as good as the day we brought them into our home.”

Rich Frishman and his wife, Brenda Hartman, of Langley, began collecting StillFire dinnerware after first buying a vase in 2000.

“That opened our eyes to more of Carol Ann’s work,” Frishman said. “In our expansive collection, we have eight incredibly attractive individual dinner bowls, hand-glazed in earth tones of sage green, brown and burnt umber. And every morning, we reach for a StillFire coffee mug.”

MAGIC OF MUD

While the glazed sleek dinnerware looks as delicate as fine china, it’s not. It’s tough enough for the dishwasher, microwave and everyday use.

Porcelain clay is smooth yet durable. Basically it’s a combination of clay and glass. Also known as china, porcelain is made of a white clay called kaolin. It requires firing at a high temperature, making it less prone to chipping and scratches.

Working with porcelain clay is a lesson in going with the flow. Quite literally. That’s because every piece results from the alchemy of minerals, heat and time.

Finely ground minerals — cobalt, chrome, titanium oxide, silica and zinc — are formulated into glazes and colored with oxides such as titanium, cobalt and iron. Glaze is dipped or poured in layers onto each pottery piece. Every layer needs time to set. Come firing time, up to 250 pieces are placed in the couple’s homemade backyard propane kiln for an all-day bake. Hamsa peers into the spy hole of the kiln often, regulating temperature rise and oxygen levels, which also affects results.

The magic of mud emerges after two days of cooling. Bold and subtle colors swim in the sunlight, swirls and accents pop out from smooth glistening surfaces.

“Glaze is glass that melts and flows at a high temperature — 2,350 degrees,” Bauer explained. “All the while I’m imagining how the glazes will come out, hoping I have them on the right thickness to make the surfaces and colors vibrant and smooth.

“Most of the pieces come out how I want them. Well, mostly.”

MORE THAN MUGS

Bauer learned pottery at the renowned Berea College in Kentucky, known for teaching and preserving the arts of Appalachia. Tuition is free, but students earn their keep through campus jobs. Bauer spun out lots of pottery, mostly mugs, through the Ceramic Apprenticeship Program. She recalls thinking at the time, ‘I’ve got more art in me than just mugs.’

On the other hand, using a one-of-a-kind cup that’s taken weeks to create and conjure out of earth and fire is not your average cuppa of Joe.

It is art. Made by hand for your hand.

“Your body responds differently to something made from the earth, something that goes back thousands of years, than when you pick up a factory-made piece,” Bauer said.

Looking over a display of her pottery arranged by the hues and shades of her moods and window views, Bauer can name the when and where of her inspiration — black fashion era of the 1980s, teal and cobalt blue of mountains and ocean, chrome and rusty bluffs of Utah, gray overcast days of Whidbey Island and, of course, one goofy period featuring bug-eyed fish.

“I want my pieces to elevate people’s experience of dining, to provide a contemplative moment,” she said. “That’s what I seek.”

StillFire Pottery is sold at numerous galleries around Puget Sound, including Penn Cove Gallery in Coupeville, and can be purchased online. Prices range from $28 to $110 per piece to $161 for dinnerware place settings. For more information, go to stillfirepottery.com.

This story originally appeared in Sound & Summit magazine, The Daily Herald’s quarterly publication.