The American Ceramic Society (ACerS) is proud to announce its participation in the first-ever International Day of Ceramics, a global initiative established by the Japan Fine Ceramics Association, the International Ceramic Federation, and other academic and industry organizations to celebrate the art, craft, and culture of ceramics worldwide. The International Day of Ceramics is observed annually on March 12.
Get Involved and Help Celebrate
As a ceramic artist, this day was made for you. Whether you work in stoneware or porcelain, functional pottery or sculptural forms, raku or reduction firing, the International Day of Ceramics is your moment to share your passion with the world.
How to join in:
Share your art on social media. Let your work speak for itself. Post images of your pieces, your studio, your process, and tell the world what drives you to create. Use #whyIclay to join a global conversation with fellow artists, collectors, and clay enthusiasts.
What ceramics means to our subscribers*:
*Some submissions were translated or lightly edited for length or grammar.
I live in the Pacific Northwest on a peninsula—a sand bar with a bay on the east and an ocean to the west. I found ceramics at my local community college, and it has been so healing. The process and evolution as I learn the craft. The community of like-minded, caring, and helpful people has amazed me. It fed and healed my aching spirit. I prefer hand building at this point but will continue to work on the wheel as I move forward. Being able to feel the clay under my hands, to watch as it goes from a “blob” to a piece of art. I needed to get some “dirt” to play in during the fall/winter/spring when working outdoors is not always available. From the first gnome I made at a local gallery, to the three semesters at the college, I am putting this into my retirement plan. —Clayre M.
Come ogni forma di espressione artistica l'uso dell'argilla ha un valore molto personale. In termini culturali posso affermare che l'utilizzo dell'argilla ha una storia che va in parallelo con l'evoluzione dell'umanità, in termini artistici è materia che non ha confini. Possiamo trattarla come vogliamo, l'argilla risponderà sempre alle nostre esigenze, possiamo sentirla come vogliamo essa saprà sempre rispecchiare la nostra intima connessione. —Giovanna G.
Translated (via Google Translate): Like any form of artistic expression, the use of clay has a deep, personal value. In cultural terms, I can say that the use of clay has a history that parallels the evolution of humanity; in artistic terms, it is a material that knows no boundaries. We can treat it as we wish, clay will always respond to our needs; we can feel it as we wish, it will always reflect our intimate connection. —Giovanna G.
Joy! Clay means joy to me! From my first pottery class, 20 years ago (when i got covered in clay from head to toe) to my first show last year (when i made my very first sale), clay just never disappoints. I feel joy when i am making something and everything goes to plan. I feel joy when i am trying something for the first time, even if it turns out to be a total disaster. (And i do have disasters!) Clay just lets me create without worrying about rules or somebody else’s expectations or whether or not it will sell. Of course, I want people to like, and maybe buy, my work. But my life won’t be ruined if they don’t because clay is the only thing I do for myself. It brings me joy. —Lynn R.
I am centered on clay. I first worked with clay in a high school art class in which I needed a fine arts elective for my college prep track. We were given the opportunity to make whatever we wanted to. I used a rolling pin and made slabs of clay which I cut into long pieces to make a wind chime. I loved the fact that you could manipulate clay into anything 3D. My mother found an artiste at a local craft fair and purchased me a gift certificate for pottery lessons. I took the lessons and ended up as an apprentice for this busy potter who needed assistance with his orders. Soon you couldn’t distinguish his work from mine, and I established my own studio and sold my work earning enough money to buy a parcel of land to build a house. I am still in that house thirty years and two husbands later. I recently had an addition built on my house to serve as my fourth studio. I still love working with clay! —Donna E.
One day while talking to some of my mates in the ceramics studio, I said that television is my hobby. I was asked, "what about ceramics?" Not missing a beat, I said that ceramics is my religion. Think about kiln gods, clay gods, and those swirling around glazes. —Mack M.
I found ceramics in April 2025 when I was 68 years old and was recovering from non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. I never thought that I could do any kind of art and was focused on my career and other things. I started to learn the wheel at a retirement community in Mission Viejo, CA, as well as some other techniques. I'm now taking a class at Irvine Valley College from Randi O'Brien and am so inspired, wanting to learn everything. I feel as if a new world has opened up to me and there is so much learning to do and so much to make. It's as if I'm using another part of my brain. Ceramics and clay are something that I want to do for whatever time I have left on this earth. —Michael R.
I tease my fiancé that I am having an affair with Clay. Working with clay is one of my favorite ways to spend time. I thoroughly enjoy wheel throwing, hand-building, tile making and sculptural artistic expressions. Placing my hands in clay melds me into a tactile relationship with our earth. It is my delight! This 3-D art form is continually challenging and rewarding. —Nila G.
It’s my main form of expression. I love exploring what I can do with it and other materials I can find like ash and rock and natural impressions. I love shaping i5 and carving and ripping and slicing it and it speaks to me. Creating with clay is a dialogue and then we meet the Woodfire. —Susan C.
Clay is a language without words. It’s how I connect and communicate freely with artists around the globe! —Hope L.
For me, clay possesses its own personality, embodying both inner spirit and outer form. It also functions as a “time machine,” reconnecting me to those formative experiences and memories! —Yen-Yu L.
Clay means so many different things to me. Clay means discovery and a constant drive to figure out new things, ways, and techniques. Clay means joy and brings so much peace and happiness into my life. Clay means loss and grief, as I put my all into something with no guarantee of an outcome. Clay is my lively hood and means the world to me. —Blaire E.
I'm the second generation of ceramists, my father started a clay company in Brazil called "Pascoal" (his name). The most important things in life: family, love, and friends came from ceramics. —Caio G.
I love nature, grew up on a small 80-acre farm in northern Bay County, Michigan. The soil is rich and contains a lot of clay which gives produce grown here, rich flavor. My older siblings and I played in the drainage ditches catching frogs etc.…and we found a vein of clay near our home on the bank of this ditch. When I was very young, I would dig out some clay mix it with dried grass and make “bird nests,” I quickly learned how clay that dries quickly cracks also discovered if too much sand or other soil was in the clay it would crumble when drying. Being retired and living further north of the farm, our community opened a pottery studio in which I took classes and became a member. It is a great reward to take a muddy lump and transform into something beautiful and useful. My imagination is boundless and my hands cannot work fast enough to fulfill my ideas. Clay allows me to connect with nature, the smells of soil from my youth, allowing me to enter my subconscious meditative building with my heart through my hands. —Jeanne D.
It gives me the opportunity to use my mind and hands to solve artistic and craft problems in a satisfying self expressive way. I appreciate ceramics as one of the oldest crafts that was useful in the past to ordinary people as well being fine art. Studying ceramics helps us to understand our ancestors as well as ourselves. —David E.
Through art, I express my thoughts and feelings. Working with clay feels like an extension of my hands that extracts those thoughts and feelings into something palpable that others can experience as well. I recognize it has its limitations, but the depth of each process (wheel throwing, handbuilding, atmospheric firing, material chemistry, etc.) makes me want to spend a lifetime delving deep on each. Touching clay and learning anything new from it, brings me the greatest joy. Sometimes I beat myself up thinking "why didn't I find it sooner? I grew up surrounded by ceramic objects." At least, I have found it now and can spend the rest of my life learning from it. —Melissa G.
I developed a love for ceramics in the early 1970's, and although I put it away for decades while I was a busy wife, mother, and teacher, I never forgot, and neither did my hands! When I retired from the classroom in 2016, I pick up a class at the local college and found the love was still there. Now, I happily make pots in my garage and barter them at a local specialty shop. ICAN has given me insight into areas of pottery I might never have otherwise approached. The videos are wonderful, and the ceramics professionals in them are so approachable and helpful. I'm almost eighty and still working at my wheel and with my own kiln. Life is good. God is Good. —Mary Alice C.
My relationship with porcelain has shaped me for as long as I can remember. My father's role as an electro-porcelain manufacturer is undeniable. He would take me with him when he went to buy raw materials, teaching me how to select materials ... In fact, from the age of 4-5, when asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I always had the answer, "I'll be a decorator" ... I sometimes think that my shift towards installation art over the years might also be related to my childhood dream of "decorating." —Deniz P.
Clay allows me to get out what’s inside me. —Tammy P.
Taking something from the earth and connecting with it, holding it, molding it is a therapeutic and healing process. You take something literally from the ground and get grounded by it. Throwing particularly for me and hand building is a deeply connective, meditative, and mindful business. You choose your shape; you literally handle and mold the clay into something beautiful that will last for centuries to come. It is a wonderful art. The holy scripture speaks of God being like the potters' hands in Jeremiah 18. ... Pottery is embedded in me, and I am so thrilled that international ceramics day falls on my birthday. Blessings and love to all you wonderful artists. —Joanna K.
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Published Nov 7, 2011
What is the International Day of Ceramics?
The American Ceramic Society (ACerS) is proud to announce its participation in the first-ever International Day of Ceramics, a global initiative established by the Japan Fine Ceramics Association, the International Ceramic Federation, and other academic and industry organizations to celebrate the art, craft, and culture of ceramics worldwide. The International Day of Ceramics is observed annually on March 12.
Get Involved and Help Celebrate
As a ceramic artist, this day was made for you. Whether you work in stoneware or porcelain, functional pottery or sculptural forms, raku or reduction firing, the International Day of Ceramics is your moment to share your passion with the world.
How to join in:
Share your art on social media. Let your work speak for itself. Post images of your pieces, your studio, your process, and tell the world what drives you to create. Use #whyIclay to join a global conversation with fellow artists, collectors, and clay enthusiasts.
What ceramics means to our subscribers*:
*Some submissions were translated or lightly edited for length or grammar.
I am centered on clay. I first worked with clay in a high school art class in which I needed a fine arts elective for my college prep track. We were given the opportunity to make whatever we wanted to. I used a rolling pin and made slabs of clay which I cut into long pieces to make a wind chime. I loved the fact that you could manipulate clay into anything 3D. My mother found an artiste at a local craft fair and purchased me a gift certificate for pottery lessons. I took the lessons and ended up as an apprentice for this busy potter who needed assistance with his orders. Soon you couldn’t distinguish his work from mine, and I established my own studio and sold my work earning enough money to buy a parcel of land to build a house. I am still in that house thirty years and two husbands later. I recently had an addition built on my house to serve as my fourth studio. I still love working with clay! —Donna E.
One day while talking to some of my mates in the ceramics studio, I said that television is my hobby. I was asked, "what about ceramics?" Not missing a beat, I said that ceramics is my religion. Think about kiln gods, clay gods, and those swirling around glazes. —Mack M.
I found ceramics in April 2025 when I was 68 years old and was recovering from non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. I never thought that I could do any kind of art and was focused on my career and other things. I started to learn the wheel at a retirement community in Mission Viejo, CA, as well as some other techniques. I'm now taking a class at Irvine Valley College from Randi O'Brien and am so inspired, wanting to learn everything. I feel as if a new world has opened up to me and there is so much learning to do and so much to make. It's as if I'm using another part of my brain. Ceramics and clay are something that I want to do for whatever time I have left on this earth. —Michael R.
I tease my fiancé that I am having an affair with Clay. Working with clay is one of my favorite ways to spend time. I thoroughly enjoy wheel throwing, hand-building, tile making and sculptural artistic expressions. Placing my hands in clay melds me into a tactile relationship with our earth. It is my delight! This 3-D art form is continually challenging and rewarding. —Nila G.
Clay means so many different things to me. Clay means discovery and a constant drive to figure out new things, ways, and techniques. Clay means joy and brings so much peace and happiness into my life. Clay means loss and grief, as I put my all into something with no guarantee of an outcome. Clay is my lively hood and means the world to me. —Blaire E.
I'm the second generation of ceramists, my father started a clay company in Brazil called "Pascoal" (his name). The most important things in life: family, love, and friends came from ceramics. —Caio G.
It gives me the opportunity to use my mind and hands to solve artistic and craft problems in a satisfying self expressive way. I appreciate ceramics as one of the oldest crafts that was useful in the past to ordinary people as well being fine art. Studying ceramics helps us to understand our ancestors as well as ourselves. —David E.
Through art, I express my thoughts and feelings. Working with clay feels like an extension of my hands that extracts those thoughts and feelings into something palpable that others can experience as well. I recognize it has its limitations, but the depth of each process (wheel throwing, handbuilding, atmospheric firing, material chemistry, etc.) makes me want to spend a lifetime delving deep on each. Touching clay and learning anything new from it, brings me the greatest joy. Sometimes I beat myself up thinking "why didn't I find it sooner? I grew up surrounded by ceramic objects." At least, I have found it now and can spend the rest of my life learning from it. —Melissa G.
I developed a love for ceramics in the early 1970's, and although I put it away for decades while I was a busy wife, mother, and teacher, I never forgot, and neither did my hands! When I retired from the classroom in 2016, I pick up a class at the local college and found the love was still there. Now, I happily make pots in my garage and barter them at a local specialty shop. ICAN has given me insight into areas of pottery I might never have otherwise approached. The videos are wonderful, and the ceramics professionals in them are so approachable and helpful. I'm almost eighty and still working at my wheel and with my own kiln. Life is good. God is Good. —Mary Alice C.
My relationship with porcelain has shaped me for as long as I can remember. My father's role as an electro-porcelain manufacturer is undeniable. He would take me with him when he went to buy raw materials, teaching me how to select materials ... In fact, from the age of 4-5, when asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I always had the answer, "I'll be a decorator" ... I sometimes think that my shift towards installation art over the years might also be related to my childhood dream of "decorating." —Deniz P.
Clay allows me to get out what’s inside me. —Tammy P.
Taking something from the earth and connecting with it, holding it, molding it is a therapeutic and healing process. You take something literally from the ground and get grounded by it. Throwing particularly for me and hand building is a deeply connective, meditative, and mindful business. You choose your shape; you literally handle and mold the clay into something beautiful that will last for centuries to come. It is a wonderful art. The holy scripture speaks of God being like the potters' hands in Jeremiah 18. ... Pottery is embedded in me, and I am so thrilled that international ceramics day falls on my birthday. Blessings and love to all you wonderful artists. —Joanna K.
Unfamiliar with any terms in this article? Browse our glossary of pottery terms!
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