2025

My body of work has been centered around the exploration of my personal spirituality by making my interior world visible in the ceramics medium. I use the contortionist to symbolize the act of exerting ourselves to produce polished perfect performances for the world to see.

A fat blue raccoon ready to rummage through your garden

Fuzzy cup is a vessel that slumps in a very bodily way. This piece has a relationship between the body and queerness, sitting very unapologetically. It's exterior is flocked giving it a velvet-like appearance which can be both off putting and attractive as it is unexpected on a utilitarian object.

As an artist, I strive to uncover beauty in the chaotic world and shape it into something harmonious. My work blends simplicity with contrast, exploring balance in disorder and creating pieces that inspire connection and reflection.

I sometimes sculpt extraordinary people... Khrushchev, Giacometti, Mephistopheles. But mostly I sculpt ordinary people... who, for whatever reason, happen across my path in the course of our days. What I hope, is that when the viewer stands before my work... there is a sense of presence.

Marionette; appears to have evolved\emerged from the slime clay of some primordial swamp. This attenuated figure has appeared from time to time in my sculptural and two dimensional work from time to time over the past 60 years ago, inspired by modern dancers from Martha Graham, Alwin Ailey etc

I create functional artwork for the home, focused on the form and utilizing it as a starting point for surface embellishment. I find inspiration from nature and children's literature. I strive for a balance between the way glaze is applied and controlling how it flows together during the firing.

My fascination with unusual shapes, an engineering background, and the challenges of getting clay to “agree” to what I want it to do, work together as I create objects from concept to reality. I take pleasure knowing that in some small way my art says something about who I am.

The melting of the ice pack and its effect not only on humans but also wildlife is a continuing concern. The iconic Polar Bear in the sculpture is a portrait as the bear attempts to step off a narrow melting glacier into an ever-widening sea.

This vessel was thrown and altered on the potter's wheel, then fired for several days in the Gustin Anagama. Ryder throws and hand-builds vessel forms and sculptures defined by the interaction of shapes in space.