This Year’s Cohort

Octpober 2025 - May 2026

Liz Vukelich

Liz Vukelich received an MFA from Alfred University in ceramics and a BA in studio art and political science from Mary Baldwin College. Previously, she apprenticed with Simon Levin at Mill Creek Pottery to learn wood firing and now has fired this way for over a decade. She also assisted Liz Lurie and Peter Beasecker, furthering her wood fire practice and development of form. Additionally, she has worked at Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts and Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts as studio staff and a work-study student respectively. During graduate school, her work shifted from pottery encouraging contemplation to relational sculpture. She now makes work for ritual, performance, and interaction alongside her pottery. These participatory works explore our connections with each other as well as give us ceremonial ways to process grief. Her work has been exhibited locally and nationally. She has taught at Sacramento State University and is excited to begin a residency at the Mendocino Arts Center.

Ichiro Enomoto

I am a Japanese American born in Seattle, Washington and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii. I first encountered ceramics in my last year of undergraduate (2022) where, on a whim, I took a ceramics course and had a fantastic professor, Brad Evans, who opened my eyes to the amazing material of clay. This brief yet potent experience with the discipline of ceramics left a lasting impact and ultimately pushed me to pursue a proper ceramics education. Post graduation, my curiosity for Japan and for Japanese ceramics led me to enroll in a full-time research center/school for learning ceramics in Tokoname, Japan called the Tokoname Tounomori Ceramic Research Institute (常滑陶の森陶芸研究所). Over a period of two years, I focused on the fundamentals, learning from scratch how to dig clay, process it by hand, create forms, and fire using electric, gas, and wood fire kilns. In addition, I also rented a separate studio investing my own time and money to create work. The time this studio afforded me allowed me to explore/experiment with different ideas. Now, I want to dive deeper into each experiment and work more concertedly within singular themes/ideas to realize and develop full bodies of work..

Sakshi Mathuria

She has self designed her learning journey, through instruction under artists Rupali Patil for printmaking, mentorship program The Clay Way with Neha Kudchadkar and with Sandeep Manchekar at Anvi Pottery.  

Sakshi was awarded the Multicultural Fellowship, 2024 by National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA)  and was recently an artist in residence at the The Colour Network*Watershed Mentorship residency. She has worked at various art studios, specifically as a ceramic studio technician at One Wheel Drive in Goa and  was part of a duo show at Ikko Gallery, Mumbai at the start of 2025.
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Sakshi Mathuria is an Indian artist born and raised  in Mumbai and now lives in the rural grasslands of Saswad, Pune, India. Here, she founded Studio MetaMaati in 2022 where she works on her art practice that is deeply connected with land. Her work centres around ecology and spirituality through personal rituals of interconnectedness with the natural world. It is an archival process of the embodied and ephemeral experiences of everyday interactions with nature. Her inquiry finds immense meaning in the tactility of clay as a response to challenge disconnected ways of living, as a means of coming back to our bodies in the act of making.
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Sebastion Schiff

Sebastian Schiff (he/they, b. 1998, Los Angeles) is a self-taught artist and educator of German-Mexican descent who works with clay as a way of preserving and exploring culture, identity, and community. Drawing from the natural world, Sebastian often personifies plants in ceramic form as a metaphor to reflect on themes of tradition, healing, and imagination. Their practice balances playfulness with depth, creating sculptural installation works that invite viewers to engage both physically and emotionally.

Initially drawn to clay for its expressive and healing properties, Sebastian now extends that experience to others by teaching ceramics at POT Studio in Los Angeles and collaborating with local organizations such as ClayDD to offer free mindfulness-based clay workshops for underserved communities. Rooted in both personal exploration and collective care, their work seeks to expand the accessibility of ceramics as a tool for healing, connection, and cultural preservation.


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