Editor’s note: This is part of a continuing series about entrepreneurs in the area.

By Molly Lovell

Staff Writer

Meryl Ruth, owner of Porcelain Grace in Biddeford’s North Dam Mill, has been a teacher for 27 years and teaches art at Deering High School in Portland. She’s been renting a studio at the mill since October where she embraces the art of ceramics.

Tell me about your art.

Mostly what I do is whimsical teapots – everything is ceramics. The concept started with my sister. The line of work is called the LAF line. It stands for my sister’s name, which is Lynn Alice Friedman. She discovered she had cancer about five years ago. We were all feeling so powerless about it, she was one of the closest people in my life so I wanted to do something to honor her while she was going through this.

My family is all about humor and laughing, so that’s why I call this my LAF line. All the pieces are whimsical and about my sister. I sign them all the LAF line, almost like signing with my sister, because of her initials.

She did pass away last year of breast cancer. But I think about her everyday through my art. To me, art is prayer and my studio is my sanctuary.

Will you continue to make pieces for the LAF line?

Yes, I do have some commissions where its something different, but when its my own, it’s about these tea pots that are about whimsy.

How do people generally find out about what you do?

 I have an incredible website. It’s www.merylruth.com. Everything I’ve done is on there. I have a great photographer. My father is my website designer. My daughter is also a website designer. She just graduate from college to be able to do that, so it’s all in the family.

What’s the most challenging piece you’ve ever done?

 Well, I feel like for me, my art is always pushing the envelope. If I don’t learn and challenge myself for every piece that I do, for me, it’s not worth it. I’m an art teacher and I love learning and growing and my students teach me every day. If I’m not challenged by the very next piece, to me, it’s like, why do it?

So, this was the last piece I did, and I feel very excited about it, it’s called “Mel-Oh-Tea-Us.” It’s the combination of a teapot and a violin.

 I was really excited moving to this spot where there are so many other artisans and craftspeople around and was inspired by the violin maker down the hall. I thought, “that would be a real challenge, I’ve never done anything like that before.” So I did a lot of drawings.

These here are all about the toothpaste tube. This is one that came back from an international show. These three are from that same series. This one is “Brighten Your Smile,” this one is the “Teath Fairy.”

This one was right after (my sister) passed away. The last food item that she ate, she wanted me to serve her lox and cream cheese and so I did this piece in honor that, that was her last bit of nutrients. It’s called “Lox and Cream Teas.”

How long have you been teaching?

I’ve been a teacher for 27 years and I’ve been doing ceramics for 12. I was a watercolorist before that, a painter. That was wonderful, but in fact, the whole ceramic thing started because of my teaching. What happened is that every five years as a teacher you have to be accredited again, so you have to take these reaccredidation courses. So I thought, “the kids love clay. I didn’t have a good experience in college with clay, so I’m just going to try it again.”

I went to Rhode Island School of Design and Boston University, and I was like, “do I really want to go to Maine College of Art?” I was almost an art snob about it, but the first day I walked in, I was like, “I’m back in college, this is so awesome.”

You have to go like four or five flights of stairs to the ceramic department. By the time I walked all the way up it was as if I shed my whole life. I wasn’t thinking about my children, my own children, I wasn’t thinking about my job, my husband, it was me and the clay. And the other part of it was, I’m kind of a princess, I like nice cloths, I like to stay all nice and neat, but with clay, it’s mud and you just get into it and you get all dirty. It was a place where I could go and do something new and unique and it just took me away. That was about 12 years ago. And then this developed and developed and developed.

How many pieces do you sell a month and how long does it take to create a piece?

Everybody always likes to ask that question, and that’s not a question I can really answer. As an example, take this one, the violin (and my newest one). Is it the hours that I’ve walked by that man’s place and gone, “I love violins, they’re beautiful,” is that part of it? Is it the hours I wake up at night and I think about the design, do I count those hours? Is it the drawing part? Is it the making the template? I don’t know how long anything takes me. If I did, the answer would probably be a million hours per piece, but it’s not like that. That piece took me a lifetime, because it’s all of my accumulative thinking processes. To get there, I’m not going back, I’m going forward, and all that I’ve learned up until I made it.

Selling, that comes in waves. If I’m having a show and I sell a couple pieces, I’m having a good month. And then there’s a month when I don’t sell a piece. But on the average, about one or two a month. And they’re costly, so it’s not like little teapot for $50. I always go back to, I’m an art teacher. I could have stayed as an art teacher full time. I only do it part time now so I can do this more. If I just wanted to throw a lot of teapots, more traditional ones, then I might as well teach, because I love that too. I’m interested in pushing the envelope and learning something new. I challenge myself and then spend as much time as I need on it, but charge what I feel they are worth. I think of them as fine art, not necessarily craft.

Going into this, were you considering extra income?

Yeah, but it was definitely more that I wanted to develop something. You always want to sell your work, because it’s a way for people to honor what you do, but on the other hand, I’ve made so many pieces and people will say, oh, you should make more of that, but that doesn’t interest me. I’d like to make a living doing what I think is the next right thing to do, as opposed to knowing what will sell.

One of things I do a lot, these teapots that are handbags, my galleries really like those. People love handbags, and they’ll spend jillions on handbags, but I was doing them for a while and it was like, I figured that one out, so the challenge wasn’t necessarily there. I still do them once in awhile, though.

You seem to have incorporated dogs into a lot of the designs here, what’s the story behind that?

I was doing those handbags, and the first one of those was this one right here, which is called, “Tea Wow Wow.” It was in honor of my daughter’s dog, Lola. That was exciting, I got the handbag and I got the dog, I was getting a lot of good feedback – and I love dogs. So then, the challenge became pugs, this one’s called “Carrying On Puggage,” so again, it’s the designer handbag, but with the doggies on it. One is called “Jackie-in-the-box,” after Jackie O and a Jack Russell (terrier) –  a designer handbag with dog.

Economy, does it affect you the same way it affect a traditional business?

I don’t think so, because this is so high end. People spend so much money on their dogs and so much money on their pocket books. There is the need and love of art and there are people who want it and are excited about it. I think my work makes people happy, so they are will to spend money on it. Dogs make people happy, handbags make people happy, shoes make people happy, it’s the same person who is saying, “I love my dog, yes, I want that.”

What do you see for the future of your work?

 I really let the clay gods and my love of it just take on whatever shape. At one point I was doing a lot of plates. Someone asked, “Oh, are you ever going to do anything different than plates?’ And then it was the handbags. If that’s the next thing that my universe is saying to do, then OK. I just let it happen.

Staff Writer Molly Lovell can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 223.