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Craft Marketing Program
Ceramic Sculptor, Potter and Teacher, Sarah Frederick, Receives Rude Osolnik Award for 2007
The Kentucky Arts Council’s Kentucky Craft Marketing Program and the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft will honor ceramic sculptor, potter, and teacher, Sarah Frederick of Louisville, Kentucky with the Rude Osolnik Award for 2007. The award honors its namesake, Rude Osolnik, the nationally acclaimed wood turner from Berea, Kentucky, who devoted his life to the development of his craft and teaching. This prestigious award recognizes artists for their contributions to the craft community, preservation of craft traditions through teaching and sharing, and exemplary workmanship. Previous recipients are Wayne Ferguson, Alma Lesch, Emily Wolfson, Arturo Alonzo Sandoval, Homer Ledford, Joseph Molinaro, Stephen Rolfe Powell, Bryon Temple (posthumously), Tim Glotzbach, Lysbeth Wallace, and Marie Emlen Hochstrasser.
Sarah Frederick earned her bachelor’s degree in fine arts from Mills College, Oakland, California in 1957 where she studied with noted ceramist, Antonio Priet. She received training at the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston; Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Deer Isle, Maine; and Murray State University, Murray, Kentucky. She completed her master’s degree in ceramics from the University of Louisville in 1978, under the guidance of Tom Marsh.
“I grew up in Louisville, Kentucky but as a young woman left for California to study art. This changed my vision of how life might be lived. I came away in love with ceramic arts, and the look and feel of California in the fifties. I have spent a lifetime in clay, studying further in Maine, Kentucky, New York, and Canada. Most of the important events in my life have centered around a relationship with clay. Landscape and organic form are of primary inspiration. Clay, glaze and fire easily create the aspect of both color and the pottery of many eras also figure in. My instincts as storyteller have urged me to move aside from vessel making into ceramic sculpture so that three-dimensional form expresses what I see and want to say,” said Sarah Frederick.
Sarah Frederick began working as an independent potter in 1980 and was active in the beginning years of the Kentucky Craft Marketing Program and Kentucky Crafted: The Market. Early in her career, she moved into the national marketplace via the American Craft Council and Rosen shows, and had an active craft business for sixteen years. She has exhibited in, and sold to craft galleries all across the country, including Bloomingdale’s in New York, the Renwick Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution, and at Neiman-Marcus in San Francisco. She has received numerous awards for her ceramics, such as the Kentucky Arts Council's AI Smith Fellowship in 1992, and was one of the featured artists in the books, Kentucky Crafts: Handmade and Heartfelt, by Phyllis George (New York: Crown Publishers, 1989) and a Pottery Tour of Kentucky, by Joe Molinaro (Lexington: Crystal Communications, 2000). Sarah’s Frederick’s work is a part of several prestigious art collections including the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft and “Ceramics Monthly” magazine. Frederick continues to work in her retirement as a studio artist and teacher.
Last year’s Rude Osolnik Award recipient, Wayne Ferguson, wrote, “Sarah has sought out teaching situations and workshops and formed meaningful relationships on a personal and professional level that are the cornerstone of a family of friends who just happen to have a common love, clay. Sarah Frederick has done just that for over a quarter of a century. She is a master potter and local and state treasure. If there is a category for an exceptional role model in the crafts world...Sarah Frederick should be at the top of the list.”
Sarah Frederick will be honored at a dinner Friday evening, June 1, 2007 from 6:30-8:30 p.m. at the Four Points Sheraton, Salon D, 1938 Stanton Way, Lexington, Kentucky. Dinner is $25 per person and seating is limited. Tickets must be purchased by May 23rd by calling 502- 564-8110, ext. 485.
The Rude Osolnik Award dinner is held in conjunction with the annual Workshop Weekend, this year titled, “Re-Inventing Your Art and Craft Business for the 21st Century,” at Spencerian College, Lexington, Kentucky, June 1-2, 2007.
Kentucky Craft Marketing is a program of the Kentucky Arts Council, a state agency in the Commerce Cabinet, Commonwealth of Kentucky. For more information, visit the KCMP website, www.kycraft.ky.gov. or call toll free 888-592-7238, local calls 502-564-8110 ext. 471, email-kycraft@ky.gov.
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Since 1981, Kentucky Craft Marketing’s purpose is to develop the state's craft industry, support and empower Kentucky artisans and craftspeople, create an economically viable environment for craft entrepreneurs, preserve the state's craft traditions, stimulate and support product development, and generate public awareness, public support and public/private partnerships.
The Program provides assistance to Kentucky residents, individuals, or groups wanting to develop as craft professionals through economic opportunities and training, to other outside entities (e.g., craft retailers, craft and art organizations, community and government agencies), and the general public. The craft industry in Kentucky contributes 252 million dollars in annual sales and Kentucky is recognized as a model state for its craft programs and its role in the $14 billion national craft industry.
About the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft
The Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft is a nonprofit organization founded in 1981. Its mission is to promote the art and craft heritage of Kentucky. The Museum is supported in part by the Fund for the Arts and the Kentucky Arts Council, a state agency in the Commerce Cabinet with support from the National Endowment for the Arts. It is located at 715 West Main Street in downtown Louisville, and it is open Monday through Friday, 10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m., Saturday 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., or by appointment. Admission is free. For more information, please call 502.589.0102 or log on to www.KentuckyArts.org.
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