Artist Andrew Gardner sows rarities and rice

BY TOM FONTANA
Correspondent

“I became curious about rice while on a trip to Bali.”

Susquehanna County artist Andrew Gardner seems to have been born highly curious from the day he entered the world in Chicago in 1937. During a life of many journeys and unlimited curiosity, Gardner settled in Thompson in 1999, where he has been creating bent willow furniture and kiln-fired ceramic pots and vases. Most recently, he has been experimenting with writing short stories and growing rice.

Gardner’s studio will be featured during the 18th Annual Artists’ Open House Weekend, Oct. 11-13. He will offer tours of his willow works collection, his kiln shed with shelves of glazed clay fascinations, and possibly his exotic rice garden.

After growing up in the Windy City, Gardner earned a BA in art in 1961 at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, and then an MA at Ohio State.

At that point, it seems curiosity really took over, and he began a sort of hodge-podge existence.

“I did some painting and filmmaking and taught art for 10 years,” he explains. “To make a living, I did some carpentry, construction, graphic design, and was art director for a publishing company. I also went to Spain for an exhibit of my paintings.”

Gardner discovered Susquehanna County around 1988, and bought a house on Jefferson St. in Thompson. Soon he stumbled upon a bent willow craftsman in the area, and learned to create a variety of chairs, stools, benches, and tables out of the flexible twigs.

By 1991, Gardner was filling his shed in Thompson with this deciduous seating (that admits some have described as “more air than chair”), which led to displaying and selling his work at craft shows and art exhibitions.

In 2001, he built his first wood-fired kiln and experiments with heat and clay began.

“Ceramics was more personal than the willow work,” Gardner said. “I refer to my relationship with ceramics as the outer manifestation of the inner journey.”

That journey grew with the construction of a second kiln in 2006, and further experimentation with a variety of glazes and other materials.

“Each piece is unique, and uncontrollable,” he said. “You can’t really plan or predict what the fire is going to do to the clay, so when a piece is finished, the outcome is often an interesting surprise.”
And then there’s his recent rice garden.

When Gardner and his wife, the writer Trebbe Johnson, traveled to Bali, Indonesia, in 2013, he became fascinated with the rice crop there. Back in the states doing research on his new obsession, he learned that the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture was looking for gardeners willing to test some strains of rice that might be grown successfully in more northern climates, such as that of Northeastern Pennsylvania.

He volunteered to be “guinea pig Gardner,” and early this year planted a small rice patch, with seeds and specific instructions provided by the government.

“I’ve had to keep strict records of the growth of the rice, step by step,” he said, “with measurements of the stalks and grain size, and descriptions of the harvest.”

So, Gardner’s lifelong curiosity has led him to sow many rarities, from bending willow twigs into seats, baking clay pots, and nurturing new grain products.

A stop at his studio should be at the top of the list for anyone planning to participate in the annual fall weekend of art observance.

Artists’ studios will be open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. each day, with over 20 locations to visit by following the hot pink ‘ART’ arrows posted throughout Susquehanna County. A brochure with a map of the stops is available at area merchants, or at: www.artiststour.com.