My adventure with art started after defecting from Poland to West Germany. A friend pressed me to take a few art classes, to which I reluctantly agreed. A few month later a love and passion was born, great enough for me to enroll in a local Junior College where I completed a two-year course with a certificate in ceramics and mixed media. A few years later life took me all over the world and finally to Australia where I put my passion behind me while I was raising a family. In 1997 life brought my family to the United States where we have settled permanently. In 2000 I decided to pursue a Bachelors degree. When I attended college, my old love and passions were brought back to life. In 2004 I was accepted to the Illinois Artisan Program in ceramics and paintings. My work ranges from traditional forms to contemporary abstracts influenced by the diverse cultures I have experienced. Development and experiments with various media bring the greatest enjoyment. In my work, I try to marry form with color. I enjoy painting traditional art in water color, acrylic abstracts on hard board, canvas and jacquard. I also include ceramic elements in my pictures. I do my own framing and matting. My art reflects my emotions, and distills my visions of nature. Sharing my work with other people gives me the greatest joy. My friends treasure my pieces and I treasure the thought of someone enjoying my work on a daily basis. I see it as an extension of my personality and passion for art. All my work is for the eyes, hands and heart. I am attracted to the earthiness and rawness of the stoneware clay, and the coarseness that lends itself beautifully to raku sculpture and vessels. I also use its polar opposite, porcelain, with its silky, smooth character, its whiteness and purity, its softness and kindness to my hands. Raku sculpture and vessel are my signatures as a ceramicist. I like the drama of raku; having to handle glowing hot work and not always knowing the results. The dry copper matte surfaces yield such unpredictable colors. Terra sigillata, applied to porcelain objects and burnished, endows them with smoothness and soft, muted colors. Naked raku with its strong contrasting black and whites has a special appeal to me as well. The rapid firing process, bringing the temperature to 1900 degrees, and rapid cooling provides a challenge to both my work and myself. My goal is to further develop techniques I employ and explore some new materials and surfaces. This will allow me to bring enriching, multicultural art ideas to the public with even more intriguing forms, colors, and techniques as I constantly develop as an artist.