Karen Winograde

Karen Winograde has been working as a potter for 50  years in Napa. She began as a student/apprentice to  production potter, studied in the Napa Valley College ceramics program, receiving an A.A. in Art Degree, and has attended numerous workshops with noted potters. In 1983 Karen began salt glazing exclusively and has developed a distinctive expression creating pieces concerned primarily with cooking and food and floral presentation. Her work is exhibited in galleries in the Bay Area and in invitational and juried shows. Karen’s pieces have been  juried into: The International Salt Glaze Competition- Koblenz, Germany; California Clay Competition, the California Design show, the Cultural Exchange exhibit between New Zealand and California Strictly Functional National.  Her kitchen and tableware can be seen in a number of magazines, have been photographed for a cookbook, and in use in restaurants. She was invited to hold a solo exhibition in Taipei, Taiwan, 1993 followed by a second solo exhibition in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 1996 where she also presented  a workshop for the first building and firing of a salt kiln in Taiwan. In November of 1996 Karen was chosen as one of a group of Western ceramicists to travel to Yixing Province in China staying 11 days in an Yixing Teapot Factory and there to work side by side with Chinese master teapot makers, working in the Yixing style. Karen is an exhibiting member of the "Association of Clay & Glass Artists of California" and holds membership in several local arts organizations.  In addition to her own art work, she taught clay classes to the local schools for 30 years and given salt glaze firing workshops.

 

"I strive to bring to the items used in everyday life a connection between the artistic and functional. Salt glazing completes this expression covering the pots with a thin durable glaze, allowing form to be the emphasis, revealing rather than covering the natural texture and body of the clay."