Bio

Once upon a time, in the land of Monongahela (Pennsylvania), a little girl and her siblings had grand adventures in outer space, the deep blue sea and the deepest jungles of their back hillside. The imaginations of these five kids grew as they did. Worldwide adventures were their privilege as adults, and now their children and grandchildren play in those same lands of make believe.

Frederick, MD artist, Janet Greer was that little girl who has traveled through time to open the imaginations of her own children and countless others in the community organizations she has affiliated with over the years. This year she joins her own adventures in ceramic art with those of her grandchildren to explore form and image transfer with a variety of firing methods including electric, gas reduction, soda, wood and raku.

Janet has a Master of Arts degree in Ceramic Arts from Hood College in Frederick, MD, and is a ceramics instructor at VisArts at Rockville, in Rockville, MD, where she keeps imagination alive with youngsters of all ages. She is the President of the Potters’ Guild of Frederick and sells her work in their Frederick Gallery.

Artist statement

"Queens and their castles, birdies and bats,
Monsters and robots, octopus attacks,
Bugs, slugs and butterflies, horses eat hay,
Squirrels and tyrannotaurs, dinosaurs play,
Ballerinas keep spinning while Narnia calls,
Fish seals and sharks and pirates so tall,
Growing imaginations out back in the wild,
Adventures alive in the heart of a child."

The substance of my imagination….Where my adventures began. Long ago and far away I was a kid with daily quests. My siblings and I scoured the universe and the depths of the oceans for our next adventure, without ever leaving the yard. This show has reference to the joy, innocence, and exuberance of my childhood. It is a tribute to the parents that allowed and encouraged creative play, to my children with whom I followed suit, and to my grandchildren who now embrace their own grand adventures!

My current body of functional ceramic forms come together to create a wonderland of childhood imagination. Porcelain becomes the canvas for the drawings of my grandchildren. The characters in these drawings lead me into my own adventure with all the firing methods at my disposal, wood, gas, soda, electric and Raku. The particular aesthetic of each of these methods allows the characters to march, gallop, dance and slither out of the layers of clays and glazes like mist and clouds and sunshine. Image transfer techniques and modern technology make it possible to replicate fluidly the carefree drawings of childhood. This is the stuff of imagination! On a good day, the drawbridge is lowered and I am invited into the adventure!