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eth Nagelberg | Ceramics Seth Nagelberg makes art that you can use each and every day, like his popular “SymShake” salt-and-pepper shakers or playful “Spin Vase.” He’s also got a series of porcelain tile, some dinnerware inspired by Styrofoam packaging, and even bowls made from kiln-fired up-cycled beer and wine bottles. But Nagelberg is not the kind of artist who makes the one-of-a-kind ceramics you’d find in a gallery. Rather, he’s among a generation of artists who are melding craft, design, and manufacturing techniques to create ceramic artworks that can be enjoyed by a wider audience. There was a time when Nagelberg wanted to be a more traditional ceramics artist. But after earning a B.F.A at the Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford, Nagelberg – who in 2015 was appointed chair of ceramics at CIA – felt burned out. So he spent time waiting tables and traveling, then turned to sculpture, eventually earning an M.F.A. at the prestigious Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. It wasn’t until after graduating from Cranbook that Nagelberg found himself again working in ceramics, this time as a shop technician at Parsons The New School for Design in New York City. But there was a twist. “I was working in a ceramics studio, but it was in the product design department at Parsons,” explains the artist, sitting in the light-filled ceramics studio at CIA. “This is something I had never expected.” At Parsons, where in 2007 he was appointed assistant professor of product design, Nagelberg explored how he could use the industrial design process to make ceramic artworks – often functional – that could be reproduced using what’s called small-batch manufacturing. It’s an approach to ceramics he’d like to make more popular at CIA. “I am very interested in small scale manufacturing. I’m hoping a portion of my students go into that and the others will continue to do conceptual work.” In 2015, he published his first book, Small Batch Manufacturing for Ceramics. Nagelberg had been exploring opportunities to move on from Parsons when the position at CIA was announced. “I had been looking for some time, but Cleveland was not on my radar,” he says. And neither was Shaker Heights, but after Nagelberg was offered the job, it didn’t take long for him and wife Jennifer Adams to figure out the community was the place for their family, which includes two daughters. “We were amazed when we saw Shaker,” says Nagelberg, who now lives in the Lomond neighborhood. “We zeroed in on it for the schools, but we were absolutely amazed by the houses. We loved how green everything was. And like a lot of people, we really liked the diversity.” A bonus: no more long commute. “My girls used to be in their pajamas and ready for bed by the time I got home, but now I can be home for dinner.” 50 SHAKERONLINE.COM | SUMMER 2016


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