Terri Kern received her Masters Degree in Fine Arts from Ohio University in 1990. After being awarded her first grant from the Ohio Arts Council in 1991, she set up a working studio at the Pendleton Arts Center in downtown Cincinnati. She was making sculptural work as well as exploring how to earn money doing what she loved-working with clay. She developed a line of clay jewelery, T.S. Kern Bodyware, and began selling it at local art fairs and shops. However, still convinced that she needed to put that Masters Degree to work, she continued to pursue teaching jobs.
In 1993-94 she was hired to teach taught art education (an art history survey that went from cave painting to Abstract Expressionism) and ceramics as an adjunct faculty member at Morehead State University in Morehead, Kentucky. That same year, she received a grant from the Kentucky Foundation for Women that allowed her to continue making sculptural work. Unable to support herself on the earnings from her part time teaching position, she began making functional ceramics on the side to supplement her income.
In less than a year she earned more income selling her ceramic wares than teaching and decided to open her own business. She moved back to Cincinnati and reopened her studio at the Pendleton Arts Center. She has made her living as a ceramic artist for the last eleven years, traveling all over the United States and recently to Germany to sell her work. She continues to pursue opportunities to advance the evolution of her sculptural work and was awarded a Summerfair Inc. grant in 2000.
Since the year 2000, Terri has continued to show her work nationally, with shows in Florida, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Kansas, Alabama and Indiana. She is also an active lecturer, talking to both high school and college level students about her experiences as a working artist. She has recently graced the cover of two published books. One, a finance textbook, is sold only on the International market. The other is a volume of poerty by five time published poet Richard Hague. Her work appears on the front and back cover of the book.
Her work is being widely collected by individuals, Peter Frampton, institutions of higher learning, The Milton Hershey School, Indiana Wesleyan University, arts organizations, Summerfair, Inc., Pinnellas County Arts Council and international corporations, Proctor and Gamble. She has two solo exhibitions in 2005 and is currently involved in an international drawing exchange with a group of artists from Germany.
She shows her work between five and seven times a year and has been recognized for excellence in the field of ceramics as her awards and grants demonstrate.
