The CLAYtonia Show
The CLAYtonia Show 2026
Friday May 15, 6-9pm,
Saturday May 16, 10-4pm,
Sunday May 17, 10-4pm
Artist Demonstrations Saturday and Sunday
Hosted by Studio Maypop
CLAYtonia is a new group of ceramic artists. The mission of CLAYtonia is to bring together high quality, thoughtful and creative ceramic work in one place as a marketplace and educational event.
Special 2026 guests
Gillan Doty was raised in the Northeast, spending time in both the Adirondacks in New York and the Monadnock region of New Hampshire. Gillan discovered clay in high school and went on to receive a BFA in Ceramics from the Maine College of Art in Portland, Maine. After graduating he was awarded several residencies including a year-long residency at the Northern Clay Center in Minneapolis, MN and at Odyssey ClayWorks in Asheville, North Carolina. Following his time at NCC and OCW, Gillan set up his own studio in Asheville where he worked for four years. In late 2024, Hurricane Helene devastated Western North Carolina and Gillan's studio was completely destroyed. He has since set up a new studio and is back to work in Asheville, NC.
My pottery is hand-built from red clay; pinched, coiled and decorated with an array of colored slips and underglazes. I aim to create wares that resonate with the user all while expressing my inherited cultural memory through narrative and latent energies; incorporating kitschy motifs and embracing girlhood with graphic lines and anamorphic characters. I acknowledge not only my own identity as a contemporary latine individual with an illustration style influenced by 90s + early 2000 animation but engage with the history of my Mexican heritage through form, clay, color and techniques. Through clay, I stay connected to my ancestry and culture while defining my own identity.
I make pottery for daily use. Looking to the simplicity and strength of natural forms and patterns for direction, I make pots in a way that shows the marks from my hands, from the tools I use, and from the fire that transforms mud to pottery. I want the hardy, organic feel and appearance of the pottery to be as grounding to the pot’s eventual owner as it is to me when I make it.
Fine bone china and porcelain are frequently associated with treasured heirlooms that are passed down between generations. My association with porcelain stems from early childhood summer trips to visit my grandmother in Northern Ireland, where she would take me to local china shops to buy small porcelain souvenirs. As I pursued my ceramic education, and started working with porcelain, these memories came to the forefront to influence both my techniques and directions.
Ronan Peterson has been in the Triangle area for 20 years and maintains Nine Toes Pottery in Chapel Hill, NC. Ronan grew up in the mountains of western North Carolina and attended UNC-Chapel Hill to obtain a BA in Anthropology and Folklore. Discovering ceramics in 1997, Ronan spent many years working for potters and attending craft schools to improve his skills in manipulating and expressing ideas through clay. He moved to the Triangle in 2003 and was able to set up his studio and teach at local craft centers for many years. Ronan’s primary focus for the past few decades has been working with bright and vibrant colored glazes to complement his decorative approaches to earthenware pottery. Recently, he has begun to explore more surfaces with both low fire and high fire soda kiln firings.
David Roswell is a studio potter based in Durham, North Carolina, and owner of Studio Maypop, a small shop where he makes pots and sells his and four other craftspeople’s work. He throws functional pots on a treadle-style kick wheel using North Carolina wild clay, and fires them in his soda kiln.