🎧 2026 Emerging Artist: Huey Lee, Kansas City, Missouri Ceramics Monthly

The audio file for this article was produced by the Ceramic Arts Network staff and not read by the author.

Ceramics Monthly: What role does color play in your work?

Huey Lee: Using a wide variety of colors in my work is a way for me to share stories with my audience. Beyond simply creating vivid imagery, I appreciate the deeper symbolism of color and the cultural contexts in which colors have been created and applied across different societies.

For example, ancient Egyptians often depicted the eyes of their sacred gods in yellow to signify dignity and eternity. Conversely, yellow has also been interpreted as the color of betrayal in Europe, as its purity can easily be contaminated and become murky. Similarly, before the era of Napoleon, green symbolized freshness and peace; however, it later became also associated with poison following the emperor’s death, because of arsenic-based pigments in his castle.

While the colors in my work are sometimes purely decorative, I find great joy in drawing from these historical references to share deeper narratives with viewers.

CM: Have your interests in working with clay evolved? What do you plan to explore next? 

HL: I am always interested in exploring new forms; in other words, I cannot work on the same subject matter continuously. When I feel a body of work is becoming repetitive or that I can no longer develop it beyond the previous series, I move on to something new to reawaken my curiosity.

Over the past few years, I have been engaged in a series of self-investigations that have allowed me to develop a variety of surface designs and textures, ranging from techniques such as pulled relief to glaze experiments that I have researched both in the past and more recently.

For my next body of work, I plan to develop an asymmetrical vessel series inspired by one of my jars that was intentionally placed upside down on the shelf. As I pivoted and viewed the jar from different angles, I found the upside-down form unexpectedly beautiful on its own. At the moment, I am not sure what narrative the future pieces will carry, but I have been considering inversion and perhaps referencing the film Upside Down (2013).

Learn more at www.hueyleearts.com or follow on Instagram @potter._lee.

May 2026: Table of Contents

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