Eliza Link is pursuing a BFA in Ceramics, BA in Art History, and Cert. Entrepreneurial Management and will Graduate in May 2023. Her medium is ceramics. Luckily, many of her creative and academic processes are now overlapping. She front-loaded her general education classes at the beginning of her schooling and now only takes classes that apply to her majors. It's still challenging at times to balance academia with artwork; however, with the support of the School of Art and Art History faculty, it works rather smoothly.

Art is important to Eliza because art is the connective tissue between all cultures and time periods. It allows shared experience betwixt time and space and is something everyone interacts with, whether intimately or on the periphery. She makes art because it is a way to reflect on herself and the world around her; past, present, and future. Eliza has been making art since her wee days of youth. She became enamored by art, particularly clay, in elementary school and continued to become further invested in middle and high school. By the time she was ready to enroll at the University of Iowa, she was firmly set on her path in the ceramic arts.

Eliza’s advice to aspiring artists is “You don't have to have a reason to make art. People have been doing it for thousands of years, prompted by just as many motivators. If you feel it, let it flow. Worry about explaining it later!”

Artist Statement: Eliza Link is finishing her fourth year at the University of Iowa studying in the studio arts and art history programs. In both her sculptural and functional work, Link is continually drawn to the intersection of art, humanity, and nature. Her work is inspired by the continuing cycles of creation and innovation throughout the history of humankind. She feels ceramic art connects her to the roots of humanity and the long line of ceramicists that have come before. She works to explore the canon of art history and its continuation in modern art by examining the roots of creativity while continuing to traverse form, surface decoration, and technique in her ceramic work. Her current body of work is wood-fired, pinched vessels, and is concerned with how life is made up of how we spend each moment of each day. These processes are vital to show that the time spent making art is also art itself.

Follow her on Instagram: @e.link.arts