: Tracy_Parker - Viewing Profile

My journey in the world of pottery started a little over 4yrs ago. I was approached online by a local potter, Melvin Rowe, looking to help art students make a little pocket money by unloading a shipment of clay he had coming. I wasn't even taking ceramics, I was a Commercial Art/Photography major, but one thing lead to another and I started apprenticing with him. It has had a huge positive impact on my life and my journey as an artist. I trade work for knowledge and materials, even have my own key to the shop and have been known to be covered in clay at 3am while everyone else is out getting hammered on a Saturday night. It's a pretty sweet arrangement.

I lost my day job working for the Federal Government in September 2011 so now I'm finding myself with a lot more free time for pottery. I have been working on my throwing skills and becoming more concerned with glaze chemistry.

I'm divorced/single and have a 16yr old daughter and a 23yr old son.

I'm hard of hearing, about 60% deaf, wear hearing aids in both ears in order to function. I don't sign and have normal speech.

I'm an April 3, 1974 Super Outbreak survivor. I lived in Hanover Indiana when it hit. I rode out an F4 while it ripped the house apart around me and destroyed our neighborhood. Over 300 people died that day. Tornadoes and severe weather sometimes find their way into my work.

The shop I apprentice at... Pottery Rowe