April 10-12, 2026

Ellen Kleckner (she/her) is an artist and educator living in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Her artistic practice weaves together community engagement, material investigation, and collaboration. She studied Ceramics at the Appalachian Center for Craft (BFA) and Ohio University (MFA). Ellen is the Executive Director of the Iowa Ceramics Center and Gl

Ellen Kleckner (she/her) is an artist and educator living in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Her artistic practice weaves together community engagement, material investigation, and collaboration. She studied Ceramics at the Appalachian Center for Craft (BFA) and Ohio University (MFA). Ellen is the Executive Director of the Iowa Ceramics Center and Glass Studio, a non-profit community art center. Ellen employs play and collusion paired with traditional practice to create new forms in collaborations with a community of makers. These forms investigate that which is commonplace through explorations of form and texture.  

Her work continually investigates connections. Connections between place, material, idea, legacy and community. Drawn from a familiar vocabulary of makers, she joins materials to create forms that provoke the agencies of their utility, calling into question which is commonplace or recognizable through explorations of form, composition and materials.

I grew up in a modest apartment in Queens, New York. I lived there with my sister and parents who both emigrated from the Caribbean to America in their youth. In that apartment, we did not have much privacy; I would seek out small places within it where I could go to be alone with my thoughts. Growing up, people begin to deal with the ide

I grew up in a modest apartment in Queens, New York. I lived there with my sister and parents who both emigrated from the Caribbean to America in their youth. In that apartment, we did not have much privacy; I would seek out small places within it where I could go to be alone with my thoughts. Growing up, people begin to deal with the idea of identity, not just who we are but how we place ourselves within groups beyond our families. For me, this placing became a cultural question. As my parents were from countries outside of the U.S, I was connected to multiple cultural groups. However having grown up here in America and not fitting the visual stereotypes of my heritage, I never felt like I truly belonged to any of those cultures. I started to become aware that the way I presented my past could be used to validate my desired place within these different groups. Reflecting on my struggle to fit in amongst these different groups in my life caused me to question the way we construct personal history in service to our desire to belong. In my more recent work I consider the tale of The Ugly Duckling, a narrative that perpetuates if you do not visually belong though it may not be your fault you must find the “right” visual group to find ones true place. What happens when that ugly duckling is not a swan but simply a duck? My work comprises this narrative with the language of the childhood home; exploring the constructed nature of the past to reveal our desire for belonging and the complexity of such a task.