Mary Curtis

Contact Mary

'A pot is the spirit of the earth made solid.'

     The Double Springs Pottery and Clayworks was established by the late Don Curtis in 1996. After completing his MFA at Utah State University Don had been teaching at the University of Arkansas Art Department beginning in the fall semester in 1969. In his last semester of teaching one of his students in the wheel class asked, "Don, we hear you are retiring soon. What are you going to do?" whereupon Don replied, "I'm going to be a full time potter".

At the time of his retirement Don had already built the clayworks studio and a Minnesota Flat Top kiln. After retirement he added a gallery and a salt kiln. Early on Don became a consistent exhibitor at the War Eagle Crafts Fair and a member of the Arkansas Crafts Guild and the annual Christmas Crafts Exhibition in Little Rock.

Mary met Don in 1958 while in undergraduate school at New Mexico Highlands University. They spent a few years teaching art in Dulce, New Mexico before moving on to Utah State University for graduate school. Don encouraged Mary to switch her art interest to clay and she took up hand building the animal forms on pots, which Don threw for her. As time went on she began to throw her own pots. She continues to produce the animal forms on pots and, in addition, her current output is oil candles, berry bowls, pitchers, creamers, mugs, etc. Many of these items are decorated with slips and leaf motifs. After Don's death Mary declared that the pottery must continue or Don would be greatly annoyed.