The thrill of the kiln drives ceramicists Nancy Train Smith and Chris Gustin

Live in: South Dartmouth

Studio“I was educated in a time when if you wanted to open a ceramics studio, you had to learn how to build your own kiln, you had to know plumbing and carpentry,” Gustin said.

The studio has two large gas kilns and four electric kilns, and the walls of one room are lined with tiles and cylinders coated with Gustin’s original glazes.

Lighting the fire: On the hill above the studio, Gustin has built an anagama wood kiln. Twice a year, ceramic artists from all over the country come to fire there. It takes five to six days to fill the kiln and seven days to fire, Gustin said, “24 hours a day, with three to five logs thrown in every three to four minutes.”

“On the last night of loading, there is a big dinner,” Smith said. “One thing I have to tell ceramic artists: They know how to cook.”

How they met: Smith saw a picture of Gustin in Ceramics Monthly magazine in 1982.

“I said, ‘I want to go out with this guy,'” she said. Gustin taught ceramics at Boston University. Smith’s studio colleague invited him and another lecturer to lunch at her studio in Cambridge.

“We were eating spaghetti with clam sauce and white wine and were not used to drinking in the middle of the day,” Smith said. “So by the end of lunch we were completely drunk.”

Nothing came of this encounter, but two years later the two took part in an exhibition together and met by chance at parties.

“We started talking, sat down and had these two-, three-hour conversations,” Gustin said.

The artists married in 1993.

How they work: Gustin builds hollow sculptures up to 5 feet tall. Smith makes nests out of clay that she rolls by hand and carefully assembles like a bird, inserting a stick here and a leaf there.

In 2022, Smith was diagnosed with macular degeneration, which affects her vision. “It opened the door to a whole new way of working,” Smith said.

“I can’t point the tool where I want it,” she said, “so I have to do all the work with my hands.”

What seemed disastrous has turned into a creative gift. “I think it’s the best work I’ve ever done,” Smith said.

Gustin helps with the glazing. “I’m basically their technician,” he says.

Note for artists: “It doesn’t matter if it’s good art or bad art,” Gustin said. “Just do it. Then you’ll react in some way. But if you don’t do it, you’ll have nothing to react to.”

THE FLUID OF PERCEPTION: Chris Gustin and Nancy Train Smith

At the Dedee Shattuck Gallery, 1 Partners Lane, Westport, through July 14. 508-636-4177, www.dedeeshattuckgallery.com/

You can reach Cate McQuaid at [email protected]. Follow her on Instagram @cate.mcquaid.