+ By Desiree Smith-Daughety + Photos by Mary Ella Jourdak
Enter a space where it’s not only socially acceptable to throw a vase, but it’s also expected—on the pottery wheel, of course, and with clay.
The space is Providence Pottery & Arts Studio. Operating in support of the nonprofit organization Providence of Maryland, The Studio, located in Arnold, has been around since 1978. Providence of Maryland has been part of the local community since its founding in 1961 and currently supports over 300 people with intellectual and developmental disabilities in Anne Arundel and Charles Counties.
Providence of Maryland’s mission is to support people with intellectual and developmental disabilities so that they can live their best lives—“Supporting people to have life-impacting opportunities to grow and contribute to their communities,” says president and CEO Karen Adams-Gilchrist. “The Pottery & Arts Studio provides employment for people interested in the arts and brings community awareness to the organization and its mission.”
One of Providence of Maryland’s tenets is that everyone can be contributing and engaged members of their communities. The Studio helps drive the organization forward, serving as a community resource that offers opportunities for people of all ages and abilities to exercise their creativity.
Self advocate and Providence board member Megan Keller enjoys coming in with her direct support professional to engage in creative activities, including painting pottery. Remarking on the extensive pottery selection, she says, “The amount of things to choose from, you can’t go wrong!”
The Studio is available to the public for classes or studio time. It recently acquired a wheelchair-accessible pottery wheel, made possible by a grant from the Annapolis Civitan Club and the Civitan Foundation, providing a more inclusive environment. “It’s a hub for people of all abilities—a place to be creative that helps improve the quality of life for those who come in,” says Joan Brady, The Studio’s manager.
Brady, a professional artist and educator, wears multiple hats within the organization, all revolving around The Studio, its processes, and its ultimate reinforcement of the organization’s mission. “The question,” she says, “is how can we best serve through art by sharing the benefits of the creative process with as many people as possible.”
The Studio spans four main areas, which Brady compares to having four microbusinesses that are run from the space: employment, education, community engagement, and retail sales. People with intellectual and developmental disabilities are hired to work in The Studio, learning the creative process and putting it into practice. There are three full-time and three part-time team members.
On the retail side, The Studio offers a full line of regionally themed handmade pottery for sale, also available at stores and galleries along the East Coast. The line includes kitchenware, home decor, and gifts. On Thursday mornings, Providence’s team members get down to production business, working together to produce Providence’s retail pottery line. Production involves the staff and the people they support, with no one person responsible for creating a piece from start to finish—it’s a team effort that goes into creating professional-grade, quality stoneware.
For example, one person makes many of the add-on pieces, called sprigs, in a variety of shapes—leaves, turtles, starfish, seashells—which are hand-applied to pottery pieces. Another team member may do slip casting, which is the technique for making the pottery forms. Everyone on the production line works on the wheel, throwing clay, and handling slab construction.
“You’ll likely find Providence pottery in many local homes,” says JoAnne Maurer, director of development and community relations. “People often receive our pottery as a gift, then visit The Studio or the website to buy more. Once they visit, they learn that much more is involved—our pottery is an introduction to the organization.”
The Studio also hires instructors to run classes. Each year, it offers three to four seasonal sessions, six to eight weeks in length, that are open to the public. Brady teaches “Try It” classes and works with community partners, including teaching art enrichment to students for Chesapeake Montessori School and the summer clay camp at ArtFarm Studios.
For those who aren’t quite ready to set a pottery wheel spinning, they can test the creative waters in a session of “paint your own pottery.” According to Brady, “This enables people who don’t envision themselves as fine artists to still try their hand at something creative.” Maurer adds, “Anyone can do it, from age 2 to 99.”
The Studio can be rented out for parties, such as for a girls’ night out or other celebrations. A party provides a low-pressure, easy entrance into the pottery world. One birthday party, held for a grandmother, included a multigenerational group, and everyone shared a fun time and creative experience together.
Nestled among mature trees, the property where The Studio is located has three buildings. The main building has a bright, welcoming work area with several pottery wheels, a small showroom area, and a modest workroom. There are two outbuildings directly behind; one houses a compact, industrious kiln room, and the other, a repurposed greenhouse, functions as a highly organized production area.
Due to space constraints, not everyone can be served in The Studio, but that doesn’t deter its enterprising team, who has traveled to off-site locations to assist with team-building activities and other events. They’re all familiar with packing up and taking along paint-your-own pottery. For one event, 100 pieces were transported, enabling a large group to participate.
Providence of Maryland remains community-focused and—with the aid of those fired-up kilns—growth-minded. The goal is to expand its efforts beyond pottery and offer more art classes. The organization continues to build relationships with area art organizations and develop new community partnerships.
Proceeds from pottery sales, class registrations, paint-your-own- pottery sessions, and rentals all contribute towards that goal. “This opens doors to engage even more in the community—everything we do ultimately goes back into the mission,” says Adams-Gilchrist. “The Studio connects the community to the organization. People get to learn and create art and are hooked by the mission. It’s a connector.”
