Feb. 10, 2008 — St. John artist Gail Van de Bogurt is inspired by the colors of nature that surround her. While she also paints, Van de Bogurt is best known for her pottery.
She said that while clay comes in naturally in browns and earth tones, she can incorporate landscape colors by using glazes.
"I put a lot of color into my work," she said.
For a time, she created pieces patterned after the blue and white pottery found in shards all over St. John, what's left of the pieces used by early settlers.
A recent trip to Thailand and Japan also inspired her, as evidenced by her recent display at Bajo El Sol, a gallery at Mongoose Junction on St. John. She also sells works at Friends of the V.I. National Park store, Caravan Gallery and Maho Bay Art Gallery at Maho Bay Camps.
Van de Bogurt, 57, operates Maho Bay Clayworks, a concession at Maho Bay Camps, but also has a studio at her home. She teaches classes for Maho guests, other visitors and residents who want to learn the ins and outs of making pots. She also creates items like custom tiles.
In keeping with the Maho Bay tradition of recycling and reuse, Van de Bogurt built a wood-fired kiln that utilizes shipping pallet wood. She said the wood is perfect for firing the kiln because it's not chemically treated like most of the scrap wood found around St. John.
Van de Bogurt's Clayworks opened in 2004, but she served as a consultant to Maho Bay before that. She said she likes the fact that operating the Maho Bay studio gives her interaction with other people, but noted she needs lots of alone time to foster inspiration.
She also teaches watercolor classes at Caneel Bay Resort and Maho Bay Camps.
She's lived on St. John since 1989 after sailing south from Long Island, New York, with her former husband. Van de Bogurt taught adult education at SUNY-Stony Brook on Long Island, her first job after graduating from the Cleveland Institute of Art with a bachelor's degree in fine arts.
The Marshall, Michigan native said she came by her talent naturally, with a grandmother who painted watercolors, a mother who did crafts and a grandfather who was a carpenter.
As a child, Van de Bogurt dug up clay from ponds near her house to make pots.
She's come a long way from those days. She recently completed a very large garden sculpture that took three years of work. With a wave shape, it features a mermaid on one side and a merman on the other.
She said such large pieces pose challenges because before the clay is fired, it's very fragile.
Van de Bogurt said she likes the idea of clay's permanence. "A couple of thousand years from now people will stumble across it," she said.
St. John's extensive art community, she said, is an aspect of island life she tends to take for granted.
"I don't notice how special it is until I go to other places," she said.
Reach Van de Bogurt at 776-6226, extension 226.
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