Molly Lithgo is a full time studio potter based in Greensboro, NC. Her wheel-thrown and hand-built red earthenware forms are delightfully decorated to imply a sense of home, whimsy, comfort, and the natural world. Academic training in painting and drawing allows her to move freely between two-dimensional, decorative expression and three-dimensional, functional design. In the end, her body of work represents a meeting of both worlds. Impressionist painters Cezanne, Renoir, Van Gogh, and Degas, whose use of color and mark-making inspire her creative process. Fields, flowers, homes, hillsides, and windswept trees frequently appear as centerpiece images in her work. Likewise, the marks and linear quality of the German Expressionists influence her carving and sgraffito techniques, giving each piece an individual identity.
By altering her forms when wet, and layering them with color and imagery before bisque firing, Molly can capture a sense of movement in her work that mimics the swaying and bending forces of the natural world.
By altering her forms when wet, and layering them with color and imagery before bisque firing, Molly can capture a sense of movement in her work that mimics the swaying and bending forces of the natural world.