Fired Works Ceramic Festival celebrates 20th year

Macon Arts Alliance’s Fired Works Ceramic Festival begins Friday and runs through May 3 at Carolyn Crayton Park in the Round Building from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. daily.

If you’re an Arts Alliance member, there’s a first-look preview party on Thursday from 4-7 p.m.

This is a special year for Fired Works: it’s the ceramic exhibit and sale’s 20th year.

“Since it began 20 years ago, Fired Works has been an extremely popular event in Macon and for those who travel here to see and buy the wonderful functional and sculptural ceramic works on display,” said Julie Wilkerson, the Arts Alliance’s executive director. “It’s been so popular we created a similar show, Fire & Ice, seven years ago to feature ceramic and glass works each November.”

Wilkerson said there will be both familiar and new artist-potters displaying work this year, but there will be one difference. Instead of a single featured artist as is usual for the show, during the 20th anniversary Fired Works, all contributors will be highlighted in the center of the Round Building with their accompanying work throughout the building.

“We usually have one featured artist’s work on a pedestal in the center, but this year they’ll all share the spotlight,” Wilkerson said. “I think the fact that we can do that speaks to the quality of the creators and the work at Fired Works, whether it’s a very useful household item or something that’s purely artistic.”

The stated mission of the Arts Alliance is to foster support for the advancement of the arts and culture in Central Georgia while striving to be an innovative leader of a thriving regional arts community. Aside from showing artists’ work in its First Street gallery, the organization maintains strategic partnerships in the community that strengthen the diversity and vibrancy of culture and the arts for tourists, residents, artists, businesses and civic groups.

While it receives some funding through the Macon-Bibb Hotel/Motel Occupancy tax as the official arts agency for Macon-Bibb, that only makes up about 8% of the Arts Alliance budget. Other funds come through donations, foundation grants, gallery sales and fundraisers like Fired Works.

“I think one reason Fired Works and Fire & Ice have been successful fundraisers for us is that they reflect who we are and what we do,” Wilkerson said. “We’re about art, artists and community, not walk-run events or road races or galas. It’s been sustainable and between things like our gallery sales and the two ceramic shows, we’ve not only raised money for Arts Alliance programs, but we’ve been able to put over $100,000 in artists’ pockets through sales. It all works together to support our mission.”

But how did Fired Works start? Where did the idea come from?

Lynn Cass was executive director from 2001-2007 and brought Fired Works into being.

“Louise Kaplan was on our board and knew of the Perspectives: Georgia Pottery Invitational in 2004 in Watkinsville, Georgia,” Cass said. “She suggested we go one weekend. It was in a pretty small space and was just rows and rows of functional pottery. When we came back, we thought about it and decided it was something we should do in Macon, only we should expand it to include sculptural pottery as well. We had a great, active board at the Arts Alliance that was enthusiastic about it and we talked to local potters like Roger Jamison and Meg Campbell who were all for it. We had 50 potters that first year.”

As opposed to the idea that Fired Works began as a small, local pottery show and then grew into something more prominent, Cass said the first year was a success with potters coming from throughout Georgia, then evolving to include folks from all over the country.

She recalls one show that featured North Carolina potter Michael Sherrill in a workshop and the $25,000 piece he brought with him.

“We were so amazed, but we were also so afraid someone would bump it,” she said. “Every year, we added a little more. There were so many people involved, like Jim and Betty Wilcox, who were big collectors and pottery enthusiasts. Jim actually took pottery classes himself and did some fine work. I love what they’re doing with Fired Works now and with Fire & Ice. It’s still a big thing.”

Not only is Fired Works celebrating its 20th year this year, but Macon Arts Alliance is also celebrating its 40th year. There will be a celebration fundraiser May 16 at the Mill Hill Community Arts Center, which will also provide a first look at items in an anniversary artists’ market on May 17 at the center. The anniversary celebration is $40 in advance and $50 at the door and includes heavy hors d’oeuvres. Next day, the artists’ market is $5 to enter with works from about a dozen select artists.

Artists will get 100% from sales of their work.

Nancy Brown Cornett is credited with being the driving force behind the Arts Alliance with its initial focus on being an arts organization roundtable gathering monthly to create a scheduling calendar to promote events and keep one another’s activities from clashing. Now, rather than a physical calendar put together by the likes of Kathy Hoskins, the calendar has followed technology and become macon365.com, which also serves as a directory of artists and arts groups and an inventory of Macon’s public art.

Innumerable volunteers, connections, partnerships, executive directors and unsung heroes worthy of credit have sustained the organization and made it a success through the years. People like Roben Weitz, who created a successful arts education program reaching into schools in the mid-1990s to the early-2000s, and Jan Beeland who was executive director from 2012-18 and oversaw the development of the Mill Hill Community Arts Center and numerous projects
connected to it.

In fulfilling its mission, the Arts Alliance has supported and led studies related to the needs of arts groups and artists in the community as well as the arts in relation to community building and art and economics.

That includes, with Wilkerson as executive director, the Arts Alliance’s leadership role in the development of the 2020 Cultural Plan for Macon leading to five strategic priorities involving tourism, education, creative industries, neighborhood development and audience development.

Here’s just a sampling of other facts and activities illustrating that the Arts Alliance is more than a gallery.

• Operation and management of East Macon Arts Village, anchored by the Mill Hill Community Arts Center
• Early activity helping to shape First Friday events downtown
• Presentation of cultural awards to deserving individuals and organizations promoting and furthering the arts
• Macon Mural Festival, which has seen a dozen or so murals added to Macon’s exponentially growing public art
• Financial aid to artists in need during COVID-19 and beyond
• Calling for and organizing public art for Macon’s Bicentennial Park

“There have been so many who’ve done such good work through the years to get us where we are,” Wilkerson said. “We owe them all a debt of gratitude along with all those working so hard today to help Macon Arts fulfill its mission. Now, with Fired Works at 20 years and the Alliance at 40, it’s time to celebrate – then back to work for the years ahead.”

Contact writer Michael W. Pannell at mwpannell@gmail.com. Find him on Instagram at @michael_w_pannell.