Intended Audience
Parran Collery is a ceramic artist based in southern Maryland, where she is the artist/owner of a studio from which she runs an art business called Eartha Handmade Tile. Founded in 1997, Eartha Tile creates a collection of limited production tiles for sale in shops and galleries throughout the US, and also creates custom commissioned mosaic designs and one of a kind artwork. Collery received a BA from the University of Vermont (summa cum laude) in 1989 and a MFA from Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University in 1992. She taught undergraduate Ceramics at Rutgers from 1990-92, and was an Adjunct Instructor of Ceramics at Toms River Community College from 1993-95. At Toms River she taught all levels of ceramics including Independent Studies. She also apprenticed at Peace Valley Tile Studio in Bucks County PA for four years before founding her own studio.
For the past 30 years, Collery has exhibited her sculptures and tile designs extensively through the states. Museum exhibitions include group shows at the Flemming Museum, Burlington VT, and the Heckscher Museum in Huntington NY. Other exhibitions include shows at Mackerel Sky Gallery, East Lansing MI, Backas Gallery, Baltimore MD, Carroll County Arts Council, Westminster MD, Indigenous Gallery, Cincinnati OH, Annmarie Sculpture Garden and Arts Center, Solomons MD, Pewabic Pottery Invitational, Detroit MI, and North End Gallery, Leonardtown, MD. She has also participated in several American Craft Council shows. Collery has been a resident artist at Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts in Maine (1999 and 2006). She is also a highly popular Artists in Education visiting artist resident, working with young students at over 15 primary and secondary schools in MD and VA since 2000 to facilitate and create permanent ceramic tile installations. These projects include numerous wall mosaics, bench projects, and free-standing mosaic garden sculptures. In addition to dozens of private commissions, commercial tile installations by Collery include The Ruddy Duck restaurant bar countertop in Solomons MD, The Rock Bar entry floor in DC, and welcome sign installation at Annmarie Art Center, Solomons MD. She is currently completing a 30-panel bird identification project for Annmarie Art Center, to be installed in 2018. She has also received two public art grants: DC Commission for the Arts H Street Revitalization Project 2004, and the 2017 inaugural Town of Leonardtown Public Art Grant, in partnership with the MD State Arts Council.