Greta Ruiz

Greta Ruiz was born in 1964 in San Francisco. She grew up near the small village of Guadalupita, in Northern New Mexico. She has been collecting beads, wood, metal and old things as long as she can remember and has developed her own organic methods which are reflected in the variety of styles that she works in.

She began seriously working with clay in 1980 with Anita Ginocchio at Santa Fe Preparatory School, in Santa Fe New Mexico. It was here that she developed a lifelong love of clay, and it was Anita that sparked Gretas’ interest in hand building. She continued studies in Claremont, CA with David Furman at Pitzer College, and then traveled to Japan in 1984 for a year of study of Japanese Art History, Fine Art and the Japanese aesthetic. Upon her return to California she spent a year studying with Paul Soldner, where she learned more about combining texture, color and shape to create integrated forms.

Greta moved back to New Mexico in 1986 to pursue her ceramic career. In 2000 she joined Santa Fe Clay and began taking classes and workshops where she explored several hand building styles. In 2002 Greta took over teaching the children’s classes at Santa Fe Clay. Working with the children reminds her to be playful in her approach to clay and that anything is possible.

Greta’s history with clay stretches long and deep. She has explored clay’s materiality and expressive potential over many years of making and teaching. Her interest has evolved to rendering clay into forms that give context to the human experience and our relationship with the natural world. A private language has emerged in which her input is only half of the conversation—the clay has its own voice that is made manifest in the final forms. The unique forms become echoes of the natural world with indirect references to plants and bodies. It is her intention that the works speak to the interconnectedness of all living things.