Scottie

Scottie Roberts Wiest has dedicated her life to the ancient craft of creating art from earth. A production potter for 35 years, Scottie Roberts Wiest continues to produce her signature stoneware and porcelain lines, however, she has branched into more unusual creativity work in the past 15 years. "When I looked at the pottery for this show, I was impressed by how many pieces had trees on them," Wiest said, noting how everything from Australia and New Zealand's aboriginal work to the Ents The Lord of the Rings trilogy infuses her work. "There's the Southern Appalachian rootedness, trunk, and branches reaching to heaven . . ." Wiest added. In fact, when Wiest and her husband realized how much of her new work includes trees, she considered titling this show "Fangorn's Forest.” Wiest explained Ents, trees that can move: "They're wonderful, powerful, slow moving, like a primordial force of nature. When the Fellowship of the Ring breaks up, the two hobbits are captured by Orcs, and they meet up the Ents in Fangorn's Forest."
Born and raised in Elkins, Scottie Roberts, received a bachelors degree in fine arts from Agnes Scott College. She was apprenticed to Takeichi Kawai in Kyoto, Japan, and then to potter Charles Counts. In 1967 Wiest opened her own shop in West Virginia. She has exhibited extensively in shows, sold work in a dozen states, and taught pottery at D&E. The West Virginia Women's Commission honored Wiest in 1987 as the top artist in the state
~Harriet Emerson
Some of the artist's work