Ruth Zakelj: Ceramics at Warren Wilson
Celeste Willhoit | November 30, 2023
Warren Wilson College (WWC) Student Ruth Zakelj sits in the ceramics studio, preparing to glaze her mugs. Her journey in ceramics started at a young age and led her to WWC in fall 2021.
Zakelj’s cousin, who previously attended WWC, was visiting some friends and invited her to come with him and see the college for a weekend that October. During this weekend, she also met Leah Leitson, WWC ceramics teacher and ceramics crew supervisor.
Zakelj took her first ceramics class when she was 12 while attending a Quaker boarding school in the mountains of North Carolina called Authur Morgan School (AMS). She took a couple more courses throughout her time at AMS but didn't take many during high school.
Zakelj is not only an art major with a ceramics concentration, but she is also on the Ceramics Studio work crew.
“Officially, our job title is ceramics studio assistant,” Zakelj stated. “Some things we do is recycle clay, so we take wet and dry clay scraps and we put them into a big machine called a pugger so we can reuse it. We also make glazes using raw materials because we make all of our own glazes at Wilson. We also fire the kilns, and lastly we tutor people, so we have hours where people can come in and get ceramics tutoring.”
When Zakelj is not in a ceramics class, some of her other requirements include school-wide general education requirements, art history, general foundational art classes like drawing 1 and 3D design, as well as an art class outside her medium. She is most interested in taking either weaving/fiber arts or printmaking.
Zakelj also discussed her honest opinions on the ceramics studio and program.
“I love Leah, the professor,” she said. “She's very intense, but that is good for me. I like intense people. I wish that we were not underfunded; the pugger is broken, and we probably can't afford to fix it, and we’re running out of clay and can't afford to buy more.”
While there are budget cuts going on, Zakelj did reflect on how much more space is now dedicated to ceramics compared to when she first came to WWC. She also said she is grateful for the quality and accessibility of the equipment provided and the freedom. She said her professor lets her classmates and crew members fire the kiln on their own, as well as just being able to freely use the equipment in general.
Zakelj's current favorite piece to make is large mixing bowls. She said they're overall very fun to make, but she also gets to flex her pottery skills. On the flip side, her least favorite part of the ceramics process is glazing. She said it requires a lot of tedious attention to detail, which is not her strong suit. She also mentioned her preferred way to approach ceramics is from a design standpoint, where she gets to look at her pots with a technical eye.
As an Art major with a ceramics concentration, Zakelj spends a good amount of her time in the studio.
“[How much time] depends,” she said. “I was prepping for a kiln firing that was just my pots in it, and outside of work crew, which is 8 hours a week, and class, which is 5 hours a week, I spent anywhere from 18 to 30 hours in here, but that's not every single week, most weeks it's probably between 10 to 15 hours.”
Zakelj says her dream after graduating would be to be a studio artist and sell her pieces to make a living. She could also see herself attending graduate school and getting a degree in early childhood education to become a preschool teacher.