About the Artist

MONIKA HINSCH-IVES, a native of Germany, has over the past two decades developed a distinctive personal style which has earned her work placements in significant collections throughout the world. Her most recent works can be found at the Spencer Art Gallery on Broad Street in Charleston and at the Art League Gallery in Hilton Head, South Carolina.

Having spent most of her youth in Tehran and Baghdad, Hinsch-Ives early on acquired a fascination for the ancient ceramic traditions of the region, whether the Babylonian glazed frieze-work or the elaborate tiles decorating the mosques of Islam. This interest, rekindled after her marriage to an international banker with whom she traveled on assignments throughout the Middle East and Africa, led in the 1980's to formal training in sculpture and ceramics at the Massachusetts College of Art, where she studied with the Japanese master Makoto Yabe.

Her sculptural work evidences stylistic variety, with imaginative and bold geometrical structures complemented by pieces displaying intricate design and the subtle use of high-fired clays, unusual glazes and understated stains. She is dedicated to exploring - both in her own work and in her teaching - the outermost boundaries of ceramic sculptural expression, melding state-of-the art ceramic techniques with the ancient artistic traditions.

She and her husband now reside in Mt. Pleasant, SC.