Sheboa Pottery

Shelley Boa

Shelley Boa that's me, began my pottery career quite by chance 12 years ago when I moved with my young family to Guelph Ontario from Toronto.  I was asked one day if I would like to try making pottery and I jumped at the chance and I have never looked back.  Largely self taught and guided by local potter Goldie Sherman, I fell in love with the whole process of  working with clay. From my early days of struggling to center a lump of red clay on a  wheel, I now create high quality functional works of art  from goblets to dinnerware and teapots,

I throw and glaze my own forms from high fire black and brown  stoneware clays. The pieces are functional as well as decorative, all my pots are food safe and oven worthy.

These days it is a magical feeling to be able to work in such an ancient medium, moulding a lump of clay into a form, to decorate with glaze and subject it to 2300 degrees of heat and then discover in the finished kiln a beautiful handcrafted work of art that will enhance a persons everyday life with a little more soul. (Opening a glaze fired kiln is like Christmas morning - Every time!)

I use various decorating techniques giving a flavour of years gone buy and of nature.  (Techniques range from burnishing (the earliest form of compacting the clay with polished river stones, spoon backs etc particles to make the vessels less porous), wax resist design, carving and various sculptural techniques both on my pottery and as solo pieces.  

One of my favourite summer pastimes is stepping back in time and becoming a Medieval or Renaissance Potter at Festivals around Ontario.  I take much inspiration from the designs of these times.

I love doing what I do. I hope my pots are filled with admirable quantities: usefulness, simplicity, strength and humility and that my pots can remind people in this high-tech society that not everything has to come off an assembly line.