Ceramics

The Art of Contemporary Ceramics

Like many art forms, ceramics has countless applications through its combination of clay as a sculptural material and the endless creativity of the artist.

People have been expressing themselves with ceramic art throughout history—in fact, all that’s left of some cultures are their ceramic artifacts. Ceramics continue to evolve, encouraging artists to explore and master techniques. Waubonsee’s ceramics program is a hands-on study of this medium where shape and science meet in the studio.

Ceramics Studio

The Ceramics Studio at Waubonsee is housed in its own building on the Sugar Grove Campus located on the southwest corner of the Student Center. It has approximately 7,000 square feet of working space. The main studio is well equipped with work tables, numerous potter's wheels (kick and electric), a slab roller, an extruder, and plenty of storage for student work.

There is a separate glaze room with a Laguna Pro V Spray Booth. There are three separate kiln rooms, one for electrics, one for gas, and the third is the exterior kiln yard, which has approximately 5,400 square feet of space for students to work, and houses our six wood kilns, which includes an Anagama, two bourry box train kilns, a cross draft tube kiln, a wood/salt kiln. There is also a newly rebuilt (2026) soda kiln and a wood fired pizza oven. The electric kiln room houses a variety of electric kilns for student usage.  We have a 1027 & a 1227 Skutts, one 3027 Shimpo Cone Art Oval, an e28t, e18S-3, Jupiter Series, and a large front loading EL2448 L&L Kiln, and a Blue Diamond Test Kiln. The gas kiln room houses two 20 cubic foot Alpine Forced Air Kilns.

The studio is also equipped with a separate clay and glaze mixing facility with a state-of-the-art Camfill Farr Gold Series Ventilation System. The clay mixing room houses a Soldner Pro Clay Mixer, a Bluebird 12S Clay Mixer, a Peter Pugger PM-100 Pug Mill, and Peter Pugger VPM-30 Deairing Pugmill for students to mix various clay bodies.