Kevin Snipes was born in Philadelphia, but grew up mostly in Cleveland, Ohio. He received a B.F.A. in ceramics and drawing from the Cleveland Institute of Art in 1994. After leaving grad school at the University of Florida in 2003 Kevin has led a seemingly nomadic artistic life, constantly making pieces no matter where he is.

Kevin has participated in several artist residency programs, including the Clay Studio, in Philadelphia and Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts, in New Castle, Maine and received a Taunt Fellowship from the Archie Bray Foundation in Montana 2008. Exhibiting both nationally and internationally, including a recent solo exhibition at the Society of Arts and Craft, Boston; Akar, Iowa City and Duane Reed Gallery in St. Louis. Kevin has exhibited as far away as Jingdezhen, China. Kevin combines his love of constructing unconventional pottery with an obsessive need to draw on everything that he produces, creating a uniquely dynamic body of work. He currently resides in Chicago, IL.

“One aspect of my work is that the narratives I portray encompass different sides, so that every side of the piece is the front side, or protagonist. This said, my approach to working with these ideas is somewhat subversive. Both the intimate scale and the jewel-like surfaces that are hallmarks of my work are a sort of misdirection that the viewer must dig through to get to the kernel of the work. I’ve loved working this way because I believe that the viewers of my work are dynamically engaged enough to understand that there is a layer of social unease below the surface.
I’m very interested in pushing boundaries of my work in a direction that reveals more of unease below the surface.” — Kevin Snipes