I am a storyteller...
translating my experiences into visual narratives that speak of vulnerability, turbulence, reciprocity, and resilience.
Artist Bio
Janis Mars Wunderlich grew up in a large Mormon family with Amish cousins in Northeastern Ohio. Her detailed ceramic sculptures and paintings capture the dualities and complexities of being human, inspired by ancient ceramic storytelling figurines and her Cherokee Folks Artist step-grandfather, Edwin George. Wunderlich blends animal, plant, and other natural elements in her narrative figures to celebrate nurturing, reciprocity, resilience, and the spirtual connectedness of all things. Her ceramic sculptures and paintings are in distinguished private and public museum collections throughout the world, including Taiwan's Yingge Ceramics Museum and The American Museum of Ceramic Art in California.
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Artist Statement
I’m learning to sit still in nature,
to let it surround me, calm me,
and speak to me.
My Cherokee step-grandfather taught me that every living thing has a spirit and is connected. He taught me that plants have healing powers and all animals played a role in our creation: turtles, swans, coyotes, wolves, deer, owls, hummingbirds-- even the tiny ants, bees, and spiders were involved in bringing forth life and continue to provide for us. My grandfather no longer walks on earth; he has been absorbed by it. Now, every time I sit in the woods, I hear his voice and remember his stories. He is in the trees and the wind and the water. He is the deer and the acorns.