Surrounded by hundreds of ceramic artists and students, two University of Southern Mississippi students never expected to hear their names called during the Alabama Clay Conference’s closing reception.
Sarah McDaniel wasn’t expecting to hear her name called over the speakers as one of the conference’s winners. Moments later, the surprise doubled when the only other USM student there, Katie Daleke, was also named a winner. The two walked away from the conference with a $100 prize and recognition for their artistic work.
“I think I almost cried. I mean, I’ve never even gotten to show my work anywhere, so the first time I do it and I win an award was really exciting and overwhelming,” McDaniel said.
The Alabama Clay Conference was held Feb. 19 to 22 and hosted around 400 attendees. Around 30 students entered the conference’s annual competition. Daleke won Best in Sculpture for her piece, “Creativity Sprouting,” while McDaniel won Best in Practical Work for her piece, “Cicada Coffee.”
The other two categories include Best in Alabama, which only includes Alabama students, and Best Overall, which is typically only won by a professor. Only one winner is chosen for each category.
McDaniel, a senior studio art major at USM, started as a painter and has only been working with ceramics for the last year and a half. She said she enjoys the physical product that comes with creating pottery rather than the abstractness of painting.
Many of her pieces are themed around nature and fauna found in Mississippi and Louisiana. Her piece “Cicada Coffee” was inspired by a rare cicada that emerges every 16 years, which she saw back in 2020. The piece is her favorite that survived a batch that was ruined due to cross-contamination.
“I had difficulty with the abstractness of painting. Pottery, you end up with a physical thing. You physically understand it. It’s there. You’re not just making something up entirely. It has to follow real-world constraints, and I thought that those constraints make it easier for me to conceive of it,” McDaniel said. “I’ve always been interested in it. I guess I have a difficult time expressing myself with words or interacting with other people so much, and that’s a solo activity, but I get to interact with people through the end product.”
McDaniel wasn’t the only one shocked to discover she had won an award. While McDaniel has only recently started working with ceramics, Daleke has long enjoyed hand-building with clay.
Daleke, a junior anthropology major with a minor in art history at USM, has been creating art since she was three, but she didn’t believe that she could make a career out of it, so instead she decided to study biology. However, it was in professor Allen Chen’s honors class that she discovered her passion for anthropology. That same class inspired her award-winning piece.
The piece is part of a set of three skulls that tell the story of human evolution and the intertwined connection between culture and art. The third skull, which won the award, explores the inner evolution of the human mind and the creative process, portraying a human and the seed of creativity within the skull.
“I think I’m most excited in the fact that I actually won something. Because there was a lot of other really amazing, incredible work there,” Daleke said. “There was I think, five or six other schools with students participating, and they had beautiful sculptures as well. There was a ton of sculptural works, so I had to compete against a lot, and I honestly didn’t think I was going to win anything.”
The conference featured many events throughout the weekend, including workshops and guest speakers. Two of the speakers included USM professor Mark Rigsby and former USM professor Allen Chen, as well as vendors and fundraisers. According to the Alabama Clay Conference’s website, the goal of the conference is to provide a balance of exhibitions and educational programs while promoting ceramic artistry.
Because the conference requires paid admission, students can complete volunteer hours during the conference to receive a discount on their tickets. Daleke chose this option, working six hours within the student gallery, keeping an eye on the art.
She said it ended up being one of her favorite parts of the conference.
“When I would be sitting there, people would walk by my piece and look at it, and take a picture of it, and it made me happy. Made me really happy,” Daleke said. “I got to talk with other students, and I talked to some really sweet students from South Alabama and they were very nice, and we talked about like different techniques and stuff, and it was just very nice to be a part of like a community like that.”
Both Daleke and McDaniel agreed that the conference is important for the ceramic community. Daleke called it an opportunity for students to get their name out and make connections with others within the field. For McDaniel, it was a chance to learn.
“I’ve never been around that many people who know anything about pottery at all. So many of them have been doing it for 10, 20, 30 years. In fact, I’d say the majority of people there have been doing it for over a decade, so it was a little intimidating, but they were all really nice, and I learned quite a bit…learned some technical info about glazing and such,” McDaniel said. “For ceramics specifically, it’s really important to pass this information around. A lot of it isn’t on the internet because a lot of potters are older and are really just passing the information through talks and shows.”
For both Daleke and McDaniel, the conference offered more than just awards. It provided them with an opportunity to share their work and connect with other artists, learn new techniques and gain valuable recognition within the ceramics community.