James Lawton

James Lawton earned a bachelor's degree in Constructive Design in Ceramics and Metals at Florida State University, Tallahassee in 1976 and a MFA in Ceramics and Printmaking at Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge in 1980.

Lawton joined the faculty at the College of Visual and Performing Arts at UMass Dartmouth in 1998 where he was Professor of Ceramics and Graduate Program Director, and former Chair of the Artisanry Department until retiring in 2021. Prior appointments include the School of the Art Institute of Chicago 1992-98, where he was tenured faculty and Department Chair, and visiting professorships at Alfred University, Louisiana State University, and University of Michigan.

He served on the Board of Trustees of the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, an artist residency located in Newcastle, Maine and previously on the Board of Studio Potter Magazine.

Lawton has been an artist in residence at the Taoxichuan International Studio and Jingdezhen Asia European American Ceramic Center (JAEA) in China; Guldagergård: International Ceramic Research Center, Denmark; International Ceramics Symposium/Residency, Kecskemét, Hungary; Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Colorado; and Penland School of Crafts, North Carolina. Lawton presents workshops and lectures around the US and abroad.

He has served in many professional capacities throughout his career, including exhibitions juror at the Fuller Craft Museum and New Hampshire Art Institute, juror for the McKnight Fellowship, Selection Committee for the SAC Medal for Excellence in Craft Award, Society of Arts+Crafts, and Delegate at the Ceramic Millennium World Conference, Amsterdam. In 2012, Lark Books published “500 Teapots, Vo. 2” which Lawton curated from over 6800 submissions and wrote the introduction.

Lawton has received numerous awards, including two National Endowment Visual Arts Fellowships, the South Carolina Artist Fellowship, and academic research grants from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.

Lawton’s work is in the collections of the Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C; the Victoria + Albert Museum, London; L.A. County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; the Mint Museum of Art + Design, Charlotte, NC; the Museum of Ceramic Art, Alfred, NY; ASU Ceramic Research Center, Tempe; Yixing City Museum, China and the Icheon World Ceramic Center, South Korea, among others and in numerous private collections. In 2015, he completed the 18-meter site-specific text piece for the River Project: Art & Nature at the Slocum’s River Preserve in Dartmouth, MA. Lawton’s work was included in the exhibition “Classics Revived-International Contemporary Ceramics Design Invitational Exhibition” at the Liling Ceramics Valley Museum, Liling, China opening September 2017.

In 2012 he was elected to the International Academy of Ceramics.