Artist Dean Schwarz and Family and Friends

In the fall of 1963, I began my senior year at a high school in a small town in northeast Iowa. A new teacher had been hired to teach art, and I soon began to work with him. As an artist, he was a painter at the time, but he would soon become an important American potter. That teacher’s name was Dean Schwarz. He was a primary mentor for me—we launched an art gallery, hitchhiked to New Orleans in the middle of winter, and, in 1964, spent the summer in Northern California, studying at Pond Farm Pottery with Bauhaus artist and author Marguerite Wildenhain.

Dean is 84 this year, and I am 76, and our friendship (along with my great fondness for his wife, author Gerry Schwarz) has continued, uninterrupted, all these many years. Most recently, it was a pleasure to be asked to design the card invitation and a photographic film tribute for a new exhibition of pots and his other creations at the Hearst Center for the Arts, in Cedar Falls IA. Titled DEAN SCHWARZ AND FAMILY AND FRIENDS, the exhibition begins on June 4 and continues through July 17, 2022.

There is a public reception on June 18, from 10:30 am to Noon. It is described as follows: Visit The Hearst to experience the world of Dean Schwarz through his work and the work of some of his family and friends. Collaborative ceramics by sons Gunnar and Lane Schwarz and grandchildren Marguerite, William and Sophie are featured alongside Jeff Bromley’s boxelder and soft maple furniture.

Dean Schwarz (© Emily Drennan)

Ceramic Art by Dean and Gunnar Schwarz