Mar 4, 2010

Lafayette Hill artist goes to potsBy Amanda GlenskyMontgomeryNews.com

Steve Chellew’s Lafayette Hill swimming pool business keeps him busy seven months of the year, but considerably more demanding is his work as an artist.

When he’s no longer wrapped up in pool season, he warms up the potter’s wheel in his basement studio and gets to work.

“I think I actually work harder at the pottery,” he said. “Sometimes I’m up at 4 in the morning throwing pots at 6 a.m.”

He works seven days a week, from five to six to 12 hours a day, seeing over a process that begins with a lump of clay that he must tend to until it’s fired, painted and finished.

Should he walk away for a week, he will ruin whatever he is creating at the time.

At first this was all a hobby, but it could be growing into something more. For 15 years Chellew had only sold his work at the Little Nook Gift Shop in Chestnut Hill. This month he will participate in his first craft show.

From March 5 to 7, he will be one of 74 artists, picked by a professional jury from a pool of 330 applicants, to display his work at the 26th annual Germantown Friends School Juried Craft Show.

Read complete article.