By: Follow South Jersey Staff
MILLVILLE, N.J. — Area residents, including groups, organizations, and students, are invited to “build” a tight-knit community connection creating art on manufactured, unfired bricks at “The Community Clay Project” sponsored by Rowan College of South Jersey’s (RCSJ) Clay College.
At the event held to connect people through the act of making art together, participants will have the option to paint, sculpt and/or carve the bricks with a message. The bricks, themselves, symbolize “the act of building.”
“The purpose of the Community Clay Project is to bring as many groups and organizations together using the vehicle of art for positive expression,” said Jacqueline Sandro-Greenwell, RCSJ director of Fine Arts and Clay College.
RCSJ’s Clay College, located in a 150 feet long facility in the Millville Arts District, is equipped with 15 pottery wheels and four kilns and offers credit and non-credit courses for students to learn the process of pottery and the ceramic arts. The facility also has a gallery located at the entrance showcases the work of students as well as local and regional artists.
A series of free workshops have been offered to the community to decorate the bricks since October and will continue throughout the months of January and February 2022.
Sandro-Greenwell is enthusiastic to see the final public work presentation.
“I am happy with how everything has progressed so far,” Sandro-Greenwell said. “That is the event I am so looking forward to: seeing all the members who participated coming together and taking pride, as a diverse group, knowing that although there are differences in every way, for this project, everyone came together to create one beautiful and meaningful piece.”
Sandro-Greenwell’s hope is that the finished decorated bricks will leave a lasting memory for the participants and community members. The bricks will be used to build a public sculpture in Millville. The free bricks, Sandro-Greenwell noted, were donated by Ryan Rutherford from the Diener Brick Company and are available for this program through “
The Building Communities Clay Project grant was funded in part by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Cumberland County Board of County Commissioners, through the Cumberland County Cultural and Heritage Commission.
For more information about how to sign up for a brick decoration workshop, call or email Jackie Sandro-Greenwell at 856-776-2381 or jgreenwe@rcsj.edu or Randolph Wilfong at 856-765-0988 or rwilfon1@rcsj.edu. For more information about RCSJ’s Clay College, please visit RCSJ.edu/ArtsInnovation/Clay-College.
RCSJ’s Clay College is located at 321 N High St., Millville.
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