Blog

Radical Clay Exhibit

Contemporary Women Artists from Japan

The Radical Clay Exhibit is being displayed at the Art Institute of Chicago until June 3rd. This exhibit displays the works of some of the most technically accomplished contemporary Japanese female ceramists from several decades. Within the male-dominated tradition, women’s participation was largely confined due to restricted access of materials and use of kilns. Despite these restrictions, many of the artists have broken down the gender barrier and paved the way for many more women to continue pushing the physical limits of producing these sculptures, each in her own distinctive way. The art displayed here includes earlier pieces shown alongside pieces from later generations who were inspired by their predecessors to continue exploring the art of creating sculptures with clay. Below are some of the pieces displayed in this exhibit.

The first piece pictured to the left was created in 2018 by Hiruma Kazuyo (born in 1947). “Ice Veins” is a piece that showcases Kazuyo’s own technique, called sekiso, of layering clay in vertical stripes. This technique gave her the ability to really capture the natural texture of an iceberg. The sculpture looks like it could start melting at any moment. This technique might require her to spend up to two months building her sculptures before firing them, which shows great dedication and attention to detail.

The second piece pictured to the left was created in the early 1990s by Tsuji Kyo (1930-2008). Kyo used traditional firing methods throughout her career. These methods caused her to undergo more prejudice than other women in the field because the operation of a kiln was not a typical role for a woman. However, despite the prejudice, she was able to show that women are strong enough to use this method and continued to make beautiful art. In “Plate with Butterfly Design” she used ash from a camellia tree to create a butterfly design emerging from the clay. The use of outside materials along with the traditional firing method gives the sculpture a fossil look.

Lastly, the third piece pictured to the left was created in 2007 by Matsuda Yuriko (born in 1943). Yuriko’s vibrant decorations on the surface come from her early aspirations to become a painter. She is known for her hand-built forms in the shape of female body parts and fills her work with surrealism, feminism, and pop sensibility. “In Her Shoes” is a comically large foot that contrasts the historical binding of women’s feet. The sculpture features long, claw like toenails and a banana heal. The piece is intentionally not appealing to look at. Instead, it sends the message that women are more than the dainty appearance defined by small, bound feet.

Many more pieces created by talented Japanese female ceramists like these are displayed in the Radical Clay Exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago.

Kristin Juszczyk

NFL Licensing Deal

Kristin Juszczyk, wife of the 49ers player Kyle Juszczyk, has just acquired a licensing deal with the NFL which allows her to use NFL logos in her apparel designs. She taught herself how to sew and has made hundreds of pieces from skirts to jumpsuits. For the past five seasons, she has been making custom outfits using football jerseys and thrifted NFL pieces for herself and other women. She has gained a following on social media by posting these designs on her accounts but went viral after deciding to send two of her designs to Taylor Swift and Brittany Mahomes. Taylor Swift wore the iconic Kansas City Chiefs jacket designed by Juszczyk to the wild card playoff game against the Miami Dolphins on January 13th. In the past month, more and more celebrities including Simone Biles, Klay Thompson, and Taylor Lautner have been sporting her custom-made apparel.

In a talk recent talk with Glamour Juszczyk explained how she is just a self-taught sewer who dove into her passion. After being around football for years and wearing the same game day apparel game after game, she finally saw an opportunity to use her skills and put her designs on the market. She explained that she is constantly pushing her skill set and undergoing trial and error to come up with new ideas for apparel. It took years and the right model to finally gain the much-deserved audience she has today. Juszczyk is an inspiration to all women to create the opportunity and pursue her passion.

To read more of Juszczyk’s talk with Glamour visit 

https://www.glamour.com/story/kristin-juszczyk-designing-taylor-swift-chiefs-puffer-jacket

Rose Rivera and Katelynn Bobb

Women in Welding

Rose Rivera and Katelynn Bobb were featured in a special report in their local Arizona news channel to show how women are continuing to break down the gender barrier in the male-dominated welding industry. They are the first women to work as lab aids for Arizona Western College’s welding program and both have competed in SkillsUSA, which is a primarily male-dominated competition. Bobb was even able to win one of the top prizes. Both women have a message for other women looking to continue breaking down the gender barriers in the welding industry.

“I say do it. It’s a great thing to do and knowing that you’re a part of something bigger than just it being a male-dominated industry is great," said Rivera.

“You got to keep moving past it. You can’t let it stop you when you get to the standstill of like oh my gosh, I shouldn’t be doing this. There are too many guys here. You just got to keep going because you’re going to get that regardless so the only way for you to get past it is just keep doing what you want to do, not what anyone else wants you to do, but what you want to do," said Bobb.

Rivera will be competing again in SkillsUSA this February.

The news clip can be viewed at https://kyma.com/news/special-reports/2024/01/29/special-report-women-in-welding/

Background

Audrey Van de Castle is the current Director of Digital Transformation and Operational Excellence at Stanley Black & Decker, Inc. She has had a long journey to get where she is now and I am honored to be sharing her story. 

Originally from Baltimore, Maryland, Audrey was a star in school. Although she was unsure of what she wanted to do in the future, she excelled in her AP and honors classes at her all-girls Catholic private school. It wasn’t until her senior year that she found she resonated with the arts: philosophy, psychology, and literature really caught her attention.

School 

When it was time to head to college, Audrey decided she wanted a big change in terms of schooling. Audrey ended up attending Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts. This school is the definition of non-traditional; it has no grade system, no tests, and no majors. Rather, it has something called divs, short for divisions, which section your schooling. Audrey spent her first div taking a variety of classes, mainly artistic since the creative aspect drew her in. She ended up taking a sculpture class, and as she puts it, it was like “a bug hit me”. From there, she learned how to weld and took a Women's Fabrication class. This class allowed her to learn many trade skills in a women-only environment. This created a healthy community where she developed her love of creating with her hands. By the end of her third div, she had mastered working with metal and wood. 

Career 

When Audrey graduated college, she returned to her home in Maryland unsure of what her future would look like. She began teaching a couple of welding classes but was in need of a space for her own welding projects. Luckily, she found a local maker space; unluckily, it was occupied by many men. As many women know in the STEM field, she was faced with hesitation by these men, “do you even know how to weld?” Audrey took up the challenge, confident in her abilities, and began to show these men just what she could do. When she was done welding, she was offered a job on the spot. Because it was part-time, she worked other customer service jobs to create some grounding for herself.

After some time, Audrey began building her presence in this maker space when they received huge news. The maker space was invested in by a local company known as Under Armour. This meant Audrey could work full-time doing what she loved and building a lasting impact on her community. They moved into a bigger space with more equipment and eventually, Audrey became the manager of the maker space. From there, she taught herself how to do 3D printing, woodworking, and master a variety of other equipment. Not only did she expand her personal skill set, but she expanded her community and outreach. She remarked that doing good in her community is what keeps her energized.                                                          

Unfortunately, this change was not all sunshine and rainbows. She had spent around four years working full-time with management which was not the best. Audrey had been getting advice from a mentor, a woman who ran her own business, when she saw a job posting for a Maker Space Manager at Stanley Black & Decker. Her mentor urged her to apply and she was awarded the job. Her mentor also gave her a piece of advice that sticks with her to this day. She had advised her to negotiate her salary: “Best believe any man is going to ask for more money, so ask for more money!” And more money she received. 

Audrey has had a winding journey in her career working for Stanley Black & Decker in which she learned a valuable lesson about corporate America, “things can change on a dime”. She started as a manager of a maker space leading a team and worked with engineers around the world to develop new products. She trained people, managed them, conducted maintenance on machinery, and assisted in the production of new products. However, as time went by, her team started getting smaller and smaller until she was assigned to a different team. In retrospect, this was excellent for her career since it took her to a new level. She had to adapt, learn new skills, and improve the ones she already had. Audrey took a role in manufacturing new technology where she trained employees who worked in the factories on new software being implemented. 

Seemingly random, she was reassigned to work in Human Resources for a short time but eventually returned to work in manufacturing. As she kept getting reassigned, she climbed the corporate ladder which came with promotions and raises. Now, Audrey works with software and hardware engineers who mainly focus on deploying software solutions on plant floors to make employees’ lives easier and more data-driven. She helps problem-solve issues such as accessibility. Some employees may not have the necessary equipment to use the software so they deployed iPads in a shared device model so employees can receive training on the software and machines they introduce. She is also helping the company transition into digitization, which takes paper-based processes and turns them into digital processes to get data that can help them find more efficient solutions for employees.

Working in STEM

Audrey’s father worked in construction from carpenter to project manager, so she had always been around the trades. She was never worried about it, especially because of her experience at an all-girls school where women were never challenged by men. This allowed her to build her self-confidence to pursue whatever her heart desired. However, going from an environment that was always welcoming to an environment where the majority of men made it unwelcoming filled her with rage and motivation. “I can change this,” she thought to herself. As she became a manager and earned some authority, she aimed to change that toxic culture. Audrey was determined to get these men to respect women and beyond that, improve the environment overall. She realized that these management roles allowed her to expand her reach and create more good in her community. 

As Audrey puts it, there were little instances in her life where she was treated differently because she was a woman. In college, her art was automatically labeled as feminist simply because she is a woman, which drove her crazy. Experiences like these snowball into anger, anger that she uses to overcome challenges and create a more inclusive environment where it doesn’t matter what gender or sexual orientation you are.

Words of Advice

“Finding out what you don’t like is just as important as finding out what you do like,” says Audrey. She advises women out there to just go for it, and try new things because you never know what it could lead to. She stated that sometimes you don’t see that a door is open until you walk through it and look back. Oftentimes, we are faced with challenges that may seem unwanted, but retrospect is a funny thing. There were many times in Audrey’s career when she was presented with a sudden change or challenge, but if it hadn’t happened, she wouldn’t be where she is today. In the moment, it can feel like the worst thing to happen, yet with time, it could end up being the best thing to happen, so don’t be afraid to take that opportunity or that risk. You never know where life will take you. 

Biography

Safa Azad is a highly motivated Third-Year Mechanical Engineering student at the Illinois Institute of Technology, originally from Chicago, Illinois and will be graduating in May 2024. She’s currently involved in Illinois Tech EcoCAR where she previously held the DEI Manager position, IIT Motorsports where she was the Business Team leader, and is a sister of the Alpha Sigma Alpha sorority.

Safa has said that she loves hanging out with her friends, playing video games, and crafting in her free time. Her most recent artsy adventure has included designing her own clothing, and she even started to slowly plan out more elaborate wearable clothes for her everyday wear. She has also been getting comfortable with the idea of traveling out of state more often, with her most recent adventure going to New York City!

When asked about her character, Safa considered herself to be a very dedicated person that can always do whatever she puts her mind to, as well as a loyal friend to the people around her, all while being a bit introverted. Her friends would describe her as an adorable, dorky human being with silly jokes at the ready. She’s also very devoted to her sorority and loves to decorate her house for any occasion and just do things to make her sorority horse feel more like a home.

To add to Safa’s remarkableness, during her freshman year of college, she participated in an internship with her yearlong fellowship at AYLF (Aspen Young Leaders Fellowship), where she collaborated with her cohort to launch a community-based project to give back to underserved communities.

How Safa Created Her Path in STEM:

Safa today is known to be a part of two heavily mechanical engineering-based organizations on campus, but while in high school, Safa didn’t even know that engineering was even a possible career option. It wasn’t until her high school gave her the opportunity to take computer science or engineering electives that she realized she could pursue a career in STEM. Software didn’t entertain much thought to Safa, so she went ahead and took the engineering electives offered at her school. In those engineering electives, she learned how to CAD full-on assemblies, which even led her to get CAD certification later on in her freshmen year. “My engineering teacher at the time was really inspiring and got me interested in various engineering disciplines,” said Azad when continuing to talk about how she chose to pursue engineering. She also mentioned that she participated in bridge-building competitions where she even came to IIT to compete.

But Azad made it very clear that what pushed her the most to pursue her future studies in engineering was her high school career in VEX Robotics. Safa and I actually bonded over the fact that we both competed in VEX Robotics in high school the first time we met. She actually recognized my hometown team’s number despite competing in completely different states due to the fact that she was friends with one of my teammates in the year above me! “Competing in VEX Robotics with my friends was the best decision of my life,” said Safa. She and her all-female robotics team went on and made history in Chicago, all while pushing themselves beyond the STEM field stereotypes, which at the same time drove Safa through her robotics career. When she was set on chasing her newly found STEM dreams, Safa went through engineering camps at UIC and UIC where she learned about all the different engineering majors. Safa said she almost went into Civil Engineering, but she eventually narrowed her decision down to Mechanical Engineering due to robotics playing a heavy role in her high school years, in addition to the creative and design aspect it comes along with Mechanical Engineering.

Academic Inspiration and Drive:

When talking to Safa about school, being a fellow STEM major myself, we both agreed that being a woman in STEM could be a bit draining at times and that it can lead to burnout. Almost every student, at least once in their academic career, has faced the issue of burnout. When I asked Safa what drives her to study she said “I’m dead set on an engineering degree now. I would always ask myself multiple times, ‘why am I doing this?’ But I couldn’t see myself doing any other major in reality.” She went on to say that she always keeps pushing herself, even when she has setbacks in her journey because she created an end goal for herself of pursuing her engineering degree. “I want to prove to those who believe that I can’t do engineering, that I in fact can,” said Safa.

We then got to the topic of her inspiration, a very niche topic, but always fascinating when you hear about it from other people, Safa had nothing but the best things to say about one person in particular: Manny Aldana, her robotics coach, who even graduated from Illinois Tech as well! “He’s always supported me through any hardships I had gone through,” said Azad. “In robotics, we didn’t have enough funding at one point for the season and he would work an endless number of hours to fundraise for our team. He made sure we had media exposure to get our names out there, and he even boosted our team morale when there were rainy days. He believed in our team and that we were more than just a bunch of girls on a team. He would support us through our designs, our competition performance, and who we were as people.” And it’s because of that support, that Safa was able to pursue engineering as more than just a dream, but an actual reality that she could achieve. “I was never the smartest in my high school,” said Safa, “but I still was committed to what I wanted to become in the future, and because of my mentor, I was able to be where I am today.”