Jack Earl

Jack Earl’s artwork never strays far from his home state of Ohio and hometown of Uniopolis. He studied art throughout high school and college, eventually graduating with an MFA from Ohio State University in 1964.

Earl took a position teaching art education and ceramics at the Toledo Museum of Art, where he first discovered European figurative ceramics through the museum’s book collection. The figurines inspired him, especially in their ability to tell a story through sculpture, and he was soon making hard-paste porcelain pieces of his own.

Unlike the more idealized European tradition, Earl’s work was exceptional in its life-like representation of everyday life in the American Midwest. His work sometimes acknowledges his own participation in an event by writing a poem or message to the subject.

Earl saw his first overseas showing take place at the International Exhibition of Ceramics in London’s Victoria and Albert Museum. He continued to be exhibited over four decades in both galleries and museums, including Clay Things at Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Museum of Contemporary Crafts, New York; and the American Craft Museum, New York. His work is included in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Milwaukee Art Museum, and Toledo Museum of Art. Earl has received the coveted Ohio Governor’s Award for the Arts for Individual Artist, the American Craft Council Fellowship, and a National Endowment for the Arts award.

Earl, along with fellow artist Tom Ladousa, participated in the inaugural Arts/Industry residency. The two artists spent one month in the Kohler Co. factory and produced over one hundred twenty artworks.