Lisa Kurtz has been a ceramic artist for over 38 years.
After receiving her master's degree in ceramics from the University of Louisville in 1985, Lisa started her pottery business, Highland Pottery, in the eclectic Highlands neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky. Since then, her work has been exhibited and sold at galleries and shops across the United States, as well as in many juried regional and national fine art shows. She has been a member of many professional juried guilds, boards, and artist associations including the Foothills Craft Guild, the Kentucky Crafts Guild, The Kentucky Department of the Arts Marketing Program, Tennessee Craft, NCECA, The New Prospect Craft Center, The Knoxville Art Alliance, and Terra Madre: Women in Clay.
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Lisa previously taught ceramics and drawing at Pellissippi State Community College in Knoxville, Tn and also taught online art history there until May of 2021. She restarted the clay program at Cleveland State Community College and taught wheel throwing and hand building through 2016. Lisa also teaches clay workshops in a variety of topics from wheel throwing to hand building and making reed handles for pottery. Most recently she taught clay at Payne Street Pottery in Louisville, Ky and clay and reed handle workshops at the Appalachian Arts Craft Center in Norris, Tennessee. From 2005 until 2015, Lisa started and directed the Whittington Creek Art Show, which began as a small holiday art sale in her home and grew into an annual juried show featuring more than 30 artists, 17 corporate sponsors, an auction benefiting Alzheimer's Tennessee, live music, art demonstrations, children's art activities and contests, and cash prizes for best in show.
Some of Lisa's accomplishments include being a Master Artist in Tennessee Craft's Master Artist Apprentice Program (MAAP), being the Artist Coordinator for the first annual Art Fair KMA at the Knoxville Museum of Art and winning a First Place Award of Distinction for her work at the 10th annual Gatlinburg Fine Arts Festival at Arrowmont. She has also been a juror for The Tennessee Craft Show in Centennial Park in Nashville, for the Foothills Craft Guild (the oldest juried guild in Tennessee), and for the Art Market Gallery in downtown Knoxville, a cooperative gallery with over 60 members. For seven years she served as the scheduler for The Art Market Gallery, an artists' cooperative gallery in downtown Knoxville with over 60 members. Her work is currently on display at Roots Up Gallery in Savannah, Georgia and in many other juried art and clay exhibits all over the country. (See the Exhibitions Page for current gallery shows that Lisa's pieces are in.)
In 2013, the District Gallery hosted Lisa's retrospective show to benefit Alzheimer's Tennessee. The show, "36 Years in Clay: A Retrospective and Benefit for Alzheimer's Disease," was covered by local news outlets including the Knoxville News Sentinel, WBIR, and the Metro Pulse. The show, put on in honor of her mother, Mary Angela Guarneschelli Kurtz, who died from Alzheimers in 2016, was a huge success.
In addition to teaching college students, her other occupations have included graphic artist, elementary and middle school art teacher, art show director and juror, and mother of three children.
Some of Lisa's accomplishments include being a Master Artist in Tennessee Craft's Master Artist Apprentice Program (MAAP), being the Artist Coordinator for the first annual Art Fair KMA at the Knoxville Museum of Art and winning a First Place Award of Distinction for her work at the 10th annual Gatlinburg Fine Arts Festival at Arrowmont. She has also been a juror for The Tennessee Craft Show in Centennial Park in Nashville, for the Foothills Craft Guild (the oldest juried guild in Tennessee), and for the Art Market Gallery in downtown Knoxville, a cooperative gallery with over 60 members. For seven years she served as the scheduler for The Art Market Gallery, an artists' cooperative gallery in downtown Knoxville with over 60 members. Her work is currently on display at Roots Up Gallery in Savannah, Georgia and in many other juried art and clay exhibits all over the country. (See the Exhibitions Page for current gallery shows that Lisa's pieces are in.)
In 2013, the District Gallery hosted Lisa's retrospective show to benefit Alzheimer's Tennessee. The show, "36 Years in Clay: A Retrospective and Benefit for Alzheimer's Disease," was covered by local news outlets including the Knoxville News Sentinel, WBIR, and the Metro Pulse. The show, put on in honor of her mother, Mary Angela Guarneschelli Kurtz, who died from Alzheimers in 2016, was a huge success.
In addition to teaching college students, her other occupations have included graphic artist, elementary and middle school art teacher, art show director and juror, and mother of three children.