TALKING VESSELS
Diane Therese Pinchot’s sculptures search the world for what’s sacred
Story and photography by Amanda Koehn
F
or Diane Therese Pinchot, art talks back. Collective and personal experiences, the spirit of the organic material, the creation process, our diverse cultures and shared dialogue, and the Earth below us all collect to create something sacred. The ceramic artist’s work is informed by the world and those around her, those far away and those who have died. It’s informed by injustices around the continent and beyond. It’s the latter that has been getting her into trouble. “My whole life, I was in trouble,” she says with a laugh during an interview with Canvas at Article/Art in Cleveland gallery, where her studio is located. “I try to behave. I’m still trying to behave.” Pinchot, who first saw success at art shows early in her career, recently shifted to working as an artist full time after completing a career as an art professor at Ursuline College in Pepper Pike. Almost everything she’s making is selling. An Order of Saint Ursula nun, Pinchot has long been inspired by the Earth and protecting it, as well as drawing attention to and fighting human rights abuses. She went to federal prison after protesting nonviolently at an American military school that’s trained killers in El Salvador and at the U.S. border with Mexico. All connected, her current work draws attention to the challenges our Earth and exploited groups specifically face as a result. “She’s a gem – I’ve never met anyone like her before,” says ceramics artist Kimberly Chapman. “She has such a calming
14 | Canvas | Spring 2022
presence and a calming influence on everybody she comes in contact with.” Pinchot’s work appears and feels organic, like it is part of the natural world and not separate from it. At 76, she continues to push toward new artistic challenges while constantly asking, what makes art sacred? And if something is sacred, how do we protect it? CORE CONNECTIONS Pinchot grew up in the Euclid projects as one of six children and enjoyed playing in the woods in her backyard. Her mother would have her play with finger paints at the kitchen table as a way to keep her out of trouble. “I say I like to practice nonviolence and all of that, but I can be pretty agitating. … I’m always checking myself, and I really got into trouble with my mouth,” she says, reflecting on her childhood. “I still do.” After graduating from Villa Angela-St. Joseph High School in 1963, she joined the Ursuline Sisters of Cleveland. Prior to graduating from Ursuline College in 1968, she won her first art show and repeated the win in 1969. She then pursued graduate studies at Case Western Reserve University/Cleveland Institute of Art and Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn., in the midst of her teaching career. Initially, she focused on metals, but saw those working with clay at CIA “were having a whole lot more fun.” She earned her final graduate degree in ceramics from Ohio University in Athens in 1990.
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