“The Great Schism”

I love to combine the pokey squishy surface of a sea cucumber with the dubious comfort and form of Victorian furniture (Artist Statement 2007 . I love the concept of combining nature and the uptight form of formal furnishings . Her work is like a way to bring the seaside indoors without the stench of something dying in a shell and without having to kill the animal that once called the shell home

Potter 's work is an invitation to those of us who have only seen the sea through old Jaques Costeau images

or through Hollywood 's lens . Instead of the highly stylized colors of Hollywood , we have the imagination and memories of a woman who spent her life on the Pacific Ocean and wants to share that love with the rest of the world . Her works somehow manages to call to mind the texture and feel of the tidal pools , an effect she managed to achieve through years of experiments with high temperature glazes (Artist Statement 2004 . For the past three years I have been experimenting with porcelain and high fire oxidation glazes . These glazes have a surface that is dense with an elusive depth and beauty The coloration effects would be impossible to replicate with under glazes . It also provides me with a new avenue to explore the marriage of color and form unburdened by objective representation (Artist Statement 2004

Indeed the combination of the porcelain and high fire glazes has kept her work with the wet look and the delicacy common to many maritime animals

An interesting twist in Potter 's work was the creation of a Cake Topper in her 2006 collection . The piece features classic images of Adam and Eve standing in a garden of green barnacles and black mussels (Potter 2006 . The figure work is...