Mixed Media/Ceramics/Sculpture

Contact Information

8125 Roanoke Street
Philadelphia, PA 19118
tel: 215-242-6896
e-mail:
Please contact artist for purchases, commissions, etc.

Artist Statement

Trained as a painter and printmaker, I have worked in a variety of other materials and forms. I have lived in Japan and Taiwan, where I learned traditional ceramic and stone rubbing techniques.

I am increasingly working on art for and about gardens. A few years ago, I stopped by Hawaii on my way to Japan and spent some time in the great tropical botanical garden on Kauai. Impressed by its lushness, the shapes and colors of plants, roots, pools, and rocks, and the sensitive siting of fine sculpture in the garden, I began a new series of paper sculptures. This work has evolved a visual language of contrasts, combining the unexpected and a new freedom for me.

My most recent sculpture is a mixed media combination of painted handmade Japanese paper with fired porcelain sections. The porcelain is pierced, carved, and enhanced with impressions from natural textures, colored slips, and glazes. This enables me occasionally to introduce lighting in some of the finished pieces. Surprising shadows and light forms emerge from these lit sculptures.

I have exhibited my work in Kyoto, Japan at the American Center, and in Tokyo. My experience in sculptural mask making has led to commissions for the Harvard Summer Theater, by the Wilma Theater for plays by Camus and lonesco, and by Pilobolus Dance Theater and the Eliot Feld Ballet, for pieces presented In New York and Europe. My book Maskmaking was published by Davis Press in 1986 and is now in its third printing. I have worked at the MacDowell Colony at Peterborough, New Hampshire, and at the Virginia Center for the Arts, Sweetbriar, Virginia.

In Philadelphia I am represented by InLiquid and Philadelphia Sculptors.

Education

Clay Studio, Philadelphia, PA
Intermediate Handbuilding Workshops

Radcliffe Pottery, Cambridge, MA
Ceramics

Abbot of Shinjuan, Daitokuji Temple, Kyoto, Japan
Watercolor

Japan Stone Rubbing Society, Kyoto, Japan
Impressions of Stone Inscriptions

Makoto Yabe, Shimpo Studio, Kyoto, Japan
Ceramics

Experimental Etching Studio, Impressions Workshop, Boston, MA
Serigraphy, Etching and Experimental Printing

School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Graphics

State University of New York, Buffalo, NY
BS, Art Education

Awards and Honors

1984
Scholarship, Banff Center of Fine Arts, Alberta, Canada

1982
Artists’ Competition Winner, Please Touch Museum, Philadelphia, PA
Commissioned by a jury to create a mask environment for young children

Residencies

1992 and 1994
Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Sweetbriar, VA

1992
Artist-in-Residence, Hotchkiss School, Lakeville, CT

1989
MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH

Professional Experience

Teaching and Workshops
2005, 2004
Paper Sculpture Workshop for Philadelphia Sculptors, Moore College of Art, Philadelphia, PA

2002
Theatre Mask Project, Philadelphia Public Schools

2001
Girard College, assembly presentation

Philadelphia Orchestra, education program

Play and Players Theater, mask workshop

1999
Instructor “Mask Sculpture Techniques”, Philips Andover Academy, Andover, MA,

1995
Six-week intensive maskmaking workshop,Temple University Center City, Philadelphia, PA

1992
Visiting artist, Aegean Center for Fine Arts, Paros, Greece

1990
Presentation of work at “Body Ornament” Symposium, Moore College of Art, Philadelphia, PA

Intergenerational workshops, Temple University and Philadelphia School System, Philadelphia, PA

1987
Lectures and Workshops, Central Academy of Arts and Design and Chinese Folk Art Society, Beijing, China

1985 – 1989
Instructor, Design Concepts course, Philadelphia University, Philadelphia, PA

Publications

Maskmaking, Davis Publications, Worcester, MA. In third printing

Bibliography

(partial list)

2005
Donahue, Victoria, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 9, 2005

Fowler, Marie, Main Line Times, November

Strauss, R. B., Weekly Press, 2 November, 2005

McDowell, Emma, Bi College News, September

2003
Rice, Robin, Philadelphia City Paper, January 8, 2003 (exhibition review)

2001
Sozanski, Edward, Philadelphia Inquirer (exhibition review)

1998
Schwarsky, B., New York Times, August (exhibition review)

Fox, M., Reading Eagle, January 10, 1998 (exhibition review)

Rice, Robin, “Carole Sivin Unmasked,” Philadelphia City Paper, January 8 – 15, 1998

1991
“Art Beat,” WYBE Channel 35, thirty-minute program on mask work

Donahue, Victoria, Philadelphia Inquirer, March

1990
Japan Times, Daily Yomiuri, and Intro Japan (feature articles)

Commissions

Wilma Theater, Philadelphia, PA
Commissioned masks for two productions

Eliott Feld Ballet, Pilobolus Dance Group, New York, NY
Commissioned masks

Selected Exhibitions

Solo

2010
Show of Hands Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

2005
Cantor-Fitzgerald Gallery, Haverford College, Haverford, PA

2003
DaVinci Art Alliance, Philadelphia, PA

2001
Connections, Nexus Foundation for Today’s Art, Philadelphia, PA

2000
Devon Unitarian Church Gallery, Devon, PA

1998
University of Pennsylvania Faculty Club, Philadelphia, PA

1997
N.A.P. Space, Kutztown, PA

1991
Gallery David, New York, NY

St. Joseph’s University, Philadelphia, PA

1990
Art Gallery, Matsuya Department Store, Tokyo

Two-person

2010
Clay College, Millville, NJ

Group

2009
Windows Throughout Old City, Philadelphia, PA

2008
Garden in Winter, Hopkins House, Haddon, NJ
Invitational

Philadelphia Sculptors at West Chester University, Michael Hall, West Chester, PA
Juried Exhibition

2004
Specific Density, Borowsky Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
Juried Exhibition

2000 – 2004
Philadelphia Sculptors exhibitions: Pecs, Hungary; Moore College of Art, Philadelphia, PA; Long Beach Island, NJ; Edinboro University, Edinboro, PA
Juried Exhibition

1999
The Object: of Sculpture, Wright State University Gallery, Dayton, OH
Invitational

1998
Philadelphia Sculptors, Grounds for Sculpture, NJ

1996
Borowsky Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
Invitational

Private Acts and Earthly Delights: Artist-made Furniture and Intimate Objects, Nexus Foundation for Today’s Art, Philadelphia, PA

1995
Loft Gallery, Shibuya Seibu, Tokyo, Japan
Invitational

1993
Group 75, Clwyd, Wales, traveling exhibition, Wales & Scotland

Undercurrents, Stedman Art Gallery, Rutgers University, Camden, NJ

1992
Philadelphia Paper Sculpture Exhibition, Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

Inside the Other, Textile Arts Center, Chicago, IL
Juried Exhibition

Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts, Wilmington, DE
Invitational

1991
Delaware Biennial, Delaware Museum of Art, Wilmington, DE
Juried Exhibition

1990
Handmade Paper, an Artist’s Medium, Bucks County Community College, Newtown, PA

Selected Exhibitions Before 1990

Solo

American Center, Kyoto, Japan

La Salle University, Philadelphia, PA

Two Points of View, Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL
Exhibition with Roberta Delaney

Group

Holter Museum, Helena, MT
Juried Paper/Fiber Arts Exhibition

Lill Street Gallery, Chicago, IL
Juried Clay Exhibition

Performances

“Three Little Girls,” Experimental Intermedia Theatre, New York, NY

“Picasso’s Four Little Girls,” Banff Center of Fine Arts, Banff, Alberta, Canada

Painted Bride Performance Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

Palimpsest, Franklin Furnace, New York, NY
Masked performance

Exhibitions Curated

2000
Dragon Year 2000, Nexus Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
International Mail Art Show

Before 1990
Mask, University City Science Center, Philadelphia, PA
Mail Art Exhibit