Гончар Джон Хантер из Мэдисона делится секретами мастерства и связью с верой

Before John Hunter begins working, he ties a denim apron around his waist and removes the rings from his fingers, setting them gently on a shelf. Then he bends over his pottery wheel, slowly but surely molding a hunk of clay into a mug or plate, beginning with only his hands and a wet yellow sponge. “It’s something that’s sort of natural for me,” Hunter says. “I like working with my hands, I always have.” Hunter, who grew up in Southern California, was introduced to pottery after graduating high school. Fifty-seven years later, Hunter is a professional studio potter who creates his pieces — including sushi plates and elephant-shaped mugs — in the basement of his Madison home. Before moving to Madison in 2022, Hunter and his wife, Suzanne, lived in Windhoek, Namibia, for 25 years. During that time, Hunter continued making ceramics using kilns he built himself, returning to the U.S. each fall with boxes of finished pieces to sell. While living in Windhoek, Hunter and his wife also established a training school for primary teachers called Teachers for Africa and a primary school called Community Hope School. “[Education] is really where my heart is,” says Hunter. His passion for education has found a new outlet through the instructional pottery videos he creates for social media. “I get a lot of fulfillment out of people being successful by learning from me,” says Hunter. From the Artist: John Hunter Working From Home I try to work in [my studio] about six hours a day. ... I’ve always had my studio next to my home. I can clean up and go upstairs and fix dinner, and then if I need to, I can come right back down to it. Peer Potters A lot of people ask me, what’s my inspiration, and I think for me, it’s really other artists. What they’ve done with the medium and how they’ve used it to create something useful or decorative [is] powerful in a lot of ways. Molded by Faith I do a series of lectures about “God, the Master Potter,” and I’m ordained. … I’m not preaching every Sunday, but I’m doing [the lectures], and occasionally I have an opportunity to talk about the real-life shaping and forming of a pot on a potter’s wheel and how that relates to the healing process and God’s work shaping and forming our hearts and our lives. Eastern Influences My work has got this sort of Asian kind of feel to it. Japan has artists that are [considered] “Living [National] Treasures,” and one of them, Shōji Hamada, has always been an inspiration to me. He rebirthed the Japanese craft movement. John Hunter | @johnhunterpottery | johnhunterpottery.com Elsa Englebert is a freelance writer and former editorial intern at Madison Magazine. COPYRIGHT 2026 BY MADISON MAGAZINE. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.