On Friday, Dec. 4, a group of students from the Chagrin Falls High School ceramics class took a field trip to the Canton Museum of Art. Prior to this field trip, a guest artist, Kristen Cliffel, came to the ceramics classes to talk about her work. Cliffel has an exhibit in the Canton Museum, the main reason why the classes visited the museum.
Ceramics teacher Libby Harold reached out to Cliffel after a positive experience she had this past summer. “Since I learned so much from her, I wanted to bring her into the class to assist and inspire the students with their final project,” said Harold.
The class is now working on their final for the semester: an ice cream project where students have to make a narrative out of ice cream. “Cliffel helped tremendously with the introduction to this project,” said Harold. “She helped the students develop ideas and gave examples from some of her own pieces.” Cliffel takes pride in her work and builds ceramic pieces related to her family. She uses a variety of different colors in her work to relate to metaphors.
The field trip was a learning experience for the students. The class had the opportunity to Skype with her after exploring her exhibit and asked her questions about her pieces.
Submitted by Annie McClurg, Student, Chagrin Falls High School
