Join us for an artist talk with John Henley! Anthropocene Archive: John Henley Artist Talk Date: Wednesday, 4/22/2026 Time: 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm (including Q&A) Step into a deeper understanding of the land beneath your feet through this special program exploring the research, materials, and process behind Anthropocene Archive by John Henley! This talk invites guests to engage with the histories and geologies of Appalachia as they view the exhibition currently on view at Contemporary Craft – Gerri Kay Exhibition Cases. Anthropocene Archive features a collection of ceramic vessels by designer John Henley materializes moments of human and land entanglement across Appalachia. Harvested from contaminated land across Pennsylvania and West Virginia, each clay body’s material composition has been polluted with heavy metals by human industry. Once processed, cast, and pit fired, these pollutants become embodied into artifacts that tell otherwise invisible narratives at the intersection of people, land, and the systems that drive power and progress. The Archive explores the impacts of this intersection in a region of our country that has been most found at the expense of these systems. It offers a uniquely objective, material approach to representing land histories and attempts to capture a moment of the unending emergence of human–nature interaction. John Henley is a designer and woodworker who crafts (mostly) functional objects. John was born in Eugene, Oregon and received a Bachelor of Design with Environmental Studies from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. John is an alum of the Steve Jobs Archive Fellowship, a prestigious cohort of nationally selected emerging artists and makers. John spent a formative year serving as an apprentice for master woodworker Tadao Arimoto, studying furniture design and making. He currently serves as the Studio Apprentice at Contemporary Craft where he supports arts education while maintaining a studio practice. His work has been displayed at Carnegie Mellon University and the Miller Institute for Contemporary Art. Photo: Courtesy of the Artist
