Helen Hill was smitten with pottery almost the second her hands touched clay. Originally from England, Helen Hill and her husband moved to the US in 1993 to do climate research in the Department of Earth Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at MIT. Before they moved to Harvard three years ago, they lived in Somerville where Helen first took up pottery, almost by accident when she saw a flyer offering summer evening classes. She explains, "I had been tinkering around with a bit of play-putty that had found its way into my office, from a party bag one of my children had brought home. I had to admit I was getting a kick out of the myriad forms I could make out of it and how, whatever it was, it was something, however abstract, right from the second I first touched it. It was summer and the soccer mom schedule was on hold so I thought why not take a class? From the moment I first sat down at the wheel I was hooked. I would throw and throw and throw, sometimes not getting home until two in the morning. I pushed and pushed myself, probing what I could make the spinning clay do, falling into bed after a night at the wheel only to have vivid dreams of the clay flowing through my hands."

Helen’s job is in oceanographic research. She spends her workday modeling ocean systems like the Gulf Stream and the Antarctic Circumpolar Current.  Most recently her focus has been looking at the way temperature and salinity vary within the ocean to try and understand the complex pathways taken by salt and heat that can help us understand the role the ocean plays in determining Earth's climate. Studying such structures for years, the principal source of her aesthetic inspiration then comes as little surprise. "You can pretty much guarantee that if you walk in to my office, on my computer screen will be frozen images of sinuously eddying fluid flow; sea-water spiraling in cascading scales of complexity.  For me each of my pots is the Earth and the glaze is the ocean. (I am fixated with the greens and blues of copper glazes). The decoration is defiantly free form; organic. Spirals recur endlessly, growing organically one out of another, patterning the surface in the rhythms of nature, meditative and hypnotic, mirroring my own experience in the forming of each piece."

"There’s nothing nicer than coming in to the studio to 2-day old clay-bodies, looking and feeling like rich dark chocolate, ripe for carving or stamping or decorating in some way, experiencing the design evolve in answer to the bodies form." Helen describes glazing as "a weird process so unlike painting that involves an act of faith. At the same time it offers the biggest chance for serendipity (or heart ache)."

A key factor in choosing the house she finally settled on here in Harvard was the enticing studio space it offered. She is developing that space into a clay studio where she has a wheel and does her finish work such as handles, knobs and carving. She also enjoys taking classes and working in the MIT studio where she started out which offers a rich assortment of glazes as well as a community of potters. Helen appreciates the camaraderie of other clay artists which helps evolve her skills and affords a constant source of inspiration for her work. Helen hopes to offer pottery classes in Harvard, both private one-on-one lessons on the wheel as well as group hand-building lessons. " I love to teach people how to create concrete objects out of the fluid clay - both on the wheel and off it. Through my therapeutic experiences at the Healing Garden I now recognize the elemental healing quality of working with clay.  In isolation it can be purely meditative-- centering for centering, and in pairs or in a group setting, working creatively can allow one to let down ones guard enabling one to talk openly,  explore feelings and share experiences that might feel less safe to release otherwise."

Throughout her childhood and adolescence Helen enjoyed drawing and painting. While she decided to pursue a career in science she expected that she would be able to pick up her art again later. While she dabbled here and there, as a mother of small children she found it difficult to give her attention to it. "In the summer of 2007 I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Now, with surgeries, chemotherapy and then the surprisingly long road to not just physical but mental recovery behind me, I look back and recognize this as a watershed in my life and in particular in my artistic life. I firmly feel now that the artistically creative part of us demands to be expressed. I look back on my life before I was diagnosed and I hear my constant refrain of being too stressed and too busy; a nagging discontent. Now that I've lived through this wake-up call, I feel required to honor this part of me that has been so over-shadowed through a working life of scientific research.

" I would love to be able to weave what I have learned from my cancer experience, together with my passion for artistic expression in general, but clay in particular, together to forge a new career combining the two but there are practical considerations." For now, Helen is enjoying reconnecting with both the creative and healing aspects of her life, finding balance within herself and stepping out to inspire others to do the same, trusting that one thing leads to another.

Helen has exhibited her work at the For Art’s Sake ‘Made in Harvard’ Show and upstairs at the gallery in the Harvard General Store. Functional pieces are both dishwasher and oven safe. For pricing or other information, contact Helen at Helen@plume.mit.edu.