Jim Lawton is Professor of Ceramics and former Artisanry Department Chair in the College of Visual + Performing Arts at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Prior to UMass, he was Associate Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago an had residencies at the Penland School of Crafts, Anderson Ranch Art Center, International Ceramics Studio (Hungary) and the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, where he currently serves on the Board of Trustees. Jim has received two NEA Visual Arts Fellowships, the South Carolina Artist Fellowship, and research grants from the Art Institute of Chicago and UMass Dartmouth. He was elected a member of the International Academy of Ceramics in 2011. His work is exhibited at the Renwick Gallery/Smithsonian Institution; L.A. County Museum of Art; Victoria and Albert Museum; the Icheon World Ceramic Center (Korea); the Mint Museum of Craft + Design, and other public and private collections. Jim lives in Dartmouth, MA and Bluffton, SC.