Joseph Sand
Born in 1982 and raised outside the small, southern Minnesota town of Austin, Joseph excelled at art at an early age. He stored Play-Doh for his creations in the family’s broken dishwasher. As a little boy growing up in the country, Joseph Sand loved to scoop up clay in the root cellar and form little cubes with it. It wasn’t until his early 20s, though, that he knew he would one day make his living as a potter.
After graduating from high school in 2001, Joseph went to the University of Minnesota-Duluth. He planned to study graphic design, but after feeling detached from an art form that required him to use a computer, Joseph changed his mind. In 2006, he earned a BFA in general studio art with a ceramics emphasis.
Sand built, brick by brick, a 40-foot-long, 8-foot-wide kiln, which he fires using pine slab offcuts from a local sawmill. Joseph based his kiln off of the anagama kilns, a type of kiln brought to Japan from China via Korea in the 5th Century.
Sand combines the styles of traditional, Southern alkaline glaze ware and East Asian design, among others. Using two wood-fired kilns, he produces both salt and ash-glazed wares, ranging in size from very large sculptural vases to planters and a variety of beautiful, functional tableware.
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