MARGE LEVY
FEBRUARY 17 - MARCH 3, 2021
Marge Levy has worked in clay for over sixty years, taught and held academic and organizational leadership positions at major schools, universities and museums concurrently. She is an adventurous traveler, underwater and above, and in her mind.
She was professor of ceramics and fine arts at Purdue University (1969-1985) and the University of Michigan (1986-1991) where she was also Dean of the School of Art and Design.
She moved to Seattle in 1991 to serve as Executive Director of Pilchuck Glass School and soon after joined Arttable where she was program coordinator and later chair of the NWChapterand on the national board.
In 2000, she started working as an independent consultant working with glass schools in Turkey and Italy and with artists and organizations in Seattle. In 2005, she developed art and cultural tours in Seattle for the Museum of Modern Art, Arttable, and affiliates of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Smithsonian, and the University of Arizona. She also worked on educational, curatorial, and development projects with PONCHO (Patrons of Northwest Cultural Organizations), On the Boards, and Pottery Northwest.
Since 2006, she has been a docent at Seattle Art Museum, among the first to introduce us to the Olympic Sculpture Park. Soon after, began to lead a variety of tours at the Seattle Art Museum downtown where she leads a group in studying the permanent collection. She has served on the Educational Advisory Council of the Bellevue Arts Museum and the Off the Boards Advisory Council to the independent creative performance center On the Boards. She was president of the Seattle Art Museum Volunteers Association and ex officio on the board of the Seattle Art Museum. Since 2019 she has served on the boards of Artist Trust and SOLA (Support Old Lady Artists).
Since 2000, she has maintained an artistic practice and makes sculpture and pots, mostly in terracotta, at Pottery Northwest, with stylistic marks derived from her international travel and interests in tattoos and cultural notations – on the body, in textiles, and embedded in expressive materials and practices. Some call her a Fairy Clay Mother.
She is a fellow of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts, was president (82-84) and was co-chair of the NCECA SEATTLE 2012 ANNUAL CONFERENCE host committee. That was a two year (volunteer) project culminating in a workshop and exhibition program, and their documentation, at almost 250 venues in the Pacific Northwest for a visiting international audience of 7000+.
At the present time she is serving as a SAM docent, in community arts endeavors, creating original ceramic work and periodically traveling to the South Pacific to scuba dive, swim with whales, and make underwater videos. In her spare time, makes elastic necklaces with letters on them, reflecting her lifelong interest in Scrabble and reading.
All photos of work courtesy of Larry Lancaster.
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Picture this: Imagine the most beautiful blue water surrounding small unpopulated islands. Green or gray and very rocky. Look at me. I sit on the side of a small wood boat with dive gear, cameras, and a tank of air to breathe for about an hour. I sit further and further back and finally lift up my feet and hold onto my mask and mouthpiece. I tumble back and drop five feet down and into warm blue water. The splash and tumble create bubbles and I follow them up and reach for the surface There I do a quick check for my dive partner and another check of my gear and feel a rush of joy as I look down through 100 feet of clear water. With the help of bright yellow fins,, I twist, turn and swim down to international fluid paradise, joining the community populated by pink and blue organic plants and orange and red animals and blue and white critters engaged in their way of being. I am a respectful visitor and settle in to watch and be, BE in their world.
How to own this; to remember and savor those moments? I glue the images into my brain and take pictures of what I see - to feel again, on demand. How to remember the waves, the currents, the swoops and curves in liquid space? I have extra weights in my gear so I just float at any depth and position that I desire. An hour later, I find the light and swim up and between the waves, find the small wooden boat, and swish into it. Slip out of gear and glide back to