The pottery of Stephen Rodriguez involves endless exploration of handmade clay formulas, high-fire stonewares ranging from black to earth-tones to porcelain. He fires in a gas kiln and often uses ash of different woods to give a cast of "light" or green glassy-ness over glazes to enhance the forms. Stephen has made a long-time commitment to mastering the expressive and proportional nuances of the classical forms of vases and bowls. They are utilitarian yet individually worked with esthetic presence in mind.

Stephen biography brings west to east: geographically - from growing up in LA to settling in CT; and by inspiration - from Mexican-American roots towards a discipline in regard mostly to the tradition of ceramic art in Asia. His pottery training started close to home at Rio Hondo College in LA in 1974, and continued at Alfred University in New York State through 1978. Stephen was studio manager of Clay Art Center in Port Chester, NY from 1981 to '88, and then Dept. Head of Ceramics at Creative Art Workshop in New Haven, CT from 1990 to the present. He received a CT Commission Fellowship in 2004. Alongside pottery-making and teaching, he builds down-draft kilns. Stephen's pottery is represented by galleries in NYC, Massachusetts, and Maine