Joyce Jablonski’s ceramic pieces decorated the walls of the UCM Gallery of Art and Design as students and faculty took their seats. It was a rainy day outside, suitable weather for this sort of thing. I sat in the back, as to not cause any sort of disruption for people there who knew Jablonski as more than just a passing face like I did. It was a day for celebrating Jablonski and her life accomplishments, including her artwork and her career as an educator.
Jablonski had worked at UCM for over 15 years and acted as a cornerstone for the art department faculty. During her celebration, many of her past students told similar stories: how their first ceramics class with Jablonski was met with blunt criticism and a no-nonsense attitude. These stories may have sounded harsh from an outside perspective, but they all ended the same way: with an anecdote about the times they would sit in Jablonski’s office, seeking comfort and friendship and finding it readily available.
I had met Jablonski only once when I first visited the campus as a college-bound high school senior. She welcomed me to the ceramics building, and when I told her I loved ceramic sculpture and would be including some pieces for my portfolio, she said she would be looking forward to seeing them. I signed up for my first ceramics class at UCM for this semester under her name. Seeing her pass away over the summer came as a shock, though I knew her past students must have been hit much harder. Seeing them speak at the celebration made me feel a unique sense of sadness, a sadness because I wish I had gotten to know the person whose work decorated the walls.
What is it that makes a good teacher? Many students will talk about the people who pushed them and who made them work just a little bit harder to reach their full potential. Others will talk about the ones who supported them through academic as well as personal means, even if that meant just being an ear to listen. Jablonski was all of these things. In hearing her friends, colleagues and students speak, her force of personality and excellence as an educator was obviously a force to be reckoned with.
“She was a force of nature,” said Mick Luehrman, previous chair of the art department. “She loved life, and packed an incredible amount of living in the time that she had, but she had a lot left to do. Those are the things to be sad about. The things to be happy about was how great it was to have her here. She inspired many students.”
Jablonski’s work itself had a large range of subject matter and form. Her work included using decals on ceramic tile to create a collage of color that she used to talk about subjects such as feminism, nature and the human mind. Her nature-based works, in the form of large, sculptural organic forms, had an air of mystery about them. Jablonski’s talent in using clay to create a broad range of 2D and 3D forms is something to be appreciated.
The loss of Joyce Jablonski has been felt throughout the art department at UCM and beyond, as a good teacher is someone who will always have a presence in the minds of their students. Jablonski’s influence will live on for decades to come through her artwork and the people she inspired every day.
