Dan Anderson received his BS degree in Art Education from the University of Wisconsin – River Falls and his MFA degree from the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills Michigan. A noted artist/educator, he headed the ceramic program at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville from 1976 until August 2002, when he retired after 32 years of teaching. A frequent workshop presenter, Anderson has lectured and demonstrated at over 150 venues over the past three decades, including Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Penland School, Anderson Ranch, Peters Valley Craft Center, Watershed and Arrowmont School. A multiple grant/award recipient, he has received a NEA Artist Fellowship, twelve Illinois Arts Council grants (including six Artist Fellowships) and a Ford Foundation Grant. Major galleries represent Dan across the United States and his work is in numerous private and permanent collections. His “mounds’ anagama wood kiln is fired at his rural Edwardsville studio, Old Poag Road Clay & Glass, twice a year. He has been wood firing for over thirty years. Dan currently serves as Vice-President on the Board of Directors of the Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, Montana. The Archie Bray Foundation recently completed a successful $2.5 million capital campaign. Anderson formerly served on the boards of Craft Alliance and the Forum for Contemporary Art (now Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis) both in St. Louis, MO. Dan was the first visual artist to take part in Leadership St. Louis (now FOCUS).
Caroline Bottom Anderson grew up in Alton Illinois. She received her BFA degree in ceramics from the University of Tulsa in 1970 and subsequently earned an MFA in Art Studio from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville in 1976. She is essentially a self-taught glass blowing artist. Caroline built and has been operating her 1,000 square foot hot glass studio, Old Poag Road Clay & Glass in rural Edwardsville, Illinois since1990. She has received numerous awards including Best of Show awards in the 46th Annual Quad-States Juried Art Exhibition at the Quincy (IL) Art Center, the "Art on the Square" Art Fair in Belleville, Illinois and the St. Louis Art Fair in Clayton, Missouri. In 2001 she received an Illinois Art Council Artist Fellowship. She exhibits her work in several galleries across the United States and has work in the permanent collection of the Mitchell Museum in Mt. Vernon, Illinois, Evansville Museum of Arts & Sciences in Evansville, Indiana and at the University Museum at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville. Her recent work has combined forged and fabricated steel with her hand blown glass.
