At her new Leetsdale studio, IM Studio, Sewickley artist Isabella “Bella” Maroon has turned her lifelong passion for clay into a space for creativity and connection. Through hands-on classes and workshops, she invites others to experience what clay has always given her — a way to reflect, to grow, and to shape something meaningful from life’s raw materials.

“Working with clay for me is more than the physical creation,” said Maroon, who opened IM Studio last month. “In life, we all need to grow and my work captures what is going on in my life at the time. Clay can be molded by a person’s experiences.”

She recalled her first maker experience — forming mud pies in the back yard of her childhood home.

“We’d dig up clay deposits from the forest trail outside the house and model little objects,” she said.

As a high schooler at Sewickley Academy, she recalled a class taught by art teacher David LaLomia, who focuses on ceramics, sculpture and pottery. Students made a caterpillar, and her caterpillar had twice as many body segments as her classmates, LaLomia said.

“Bella is one of only a handful of students I’ve taught in nearly three decades who have pursued ceramics in college and beyond, and I wouldn’t be surprised if some of my former students find their way to her studio to rekindle their own love of creating in clay,” LaLomia said. “She is constantly pushing the limits and learning new media and new techniques.”

Those first creations are symbolic of Maroon’s identity and how she views the process of transformation to begin at what she calls a “person’s place of origin, at their start.”

“That class gave me an opportunity to work in a self-directed way,” Maroon said. “That really helped me with the psychology of being a teenager. That caterpillar and the mud pies represent milestones in my life and moments in my life.”

Giving others those opportunities is a reason Maroon opened her studio to offer classes and workshops. The 2,200-square-foot space has plenty of room for making, or people can bring in what they’ve made and she will fire those items in her industrial-grade electric kiln.

“I want the studio to be here for the community,” said Maroon, while hosting her mother, Lynn Maroon of Franklin Park, and friends Jeaneen Osborne of Ohio Township and Donna Sebastian of Kennedy for a late afternoon class. “I grew up here and I recognize where my inspiration comes from. There is a unique vibe in Sewickley.”

Her art has connected with so many people, her father, Dr. Joseph Maroon, said.

“Those who work with their hands are laborers,” Joe Maroon said. “Those who work with their hands and their heads are craftsmen. And those who work with their hands, their head and their heart are artists.”

Maroon, 30, who has been transitioning into more functional work, was commissioned to create bonsai planters for a client. In the process, she’s learning about bonsai trees, which is another realm of art to discover how a living thing will exist in something she’s made.

Maroon trained at the Art Institute of Chicago and did graduate work at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan.

Clay is her primary medium.

“There is something very personal about the making process, especially with clay,” she said. “It interacts with our body. There is also movement in art. There has never been a civilization without art. It is a form of creativity. It has a relaxing vibe. You can create what you envision.”

Maroon recalled growing up around the MacKenzie-Childs ceramic collections of her mother and grandmother. The pieces add vibrancy to both functional and nonfunctional wares, she said.

JoAnne Klimivich Harrop | TribLive Lynn Maroon (back) of Franklin Park, Donna Sebastian of Kennedy (center) and Jeaneen Osborne of Ohio Township make clay pinch pots at IM Studio in Leetsdale Industrial Park on Nov. 3.  

Lynn Maroon and her friends were making clay pinch pots, where they began with a ball of clay, placed their thumb in the middle of it and pinched the sides to form a pot.

“This is therapeutic,” Lynn Maroon said. “We sit here and talk, while we create. It’s girl time.”

Sebastian said the class is a fun way to spend time with her friends and to make something that is uniquely hers.

“I am hoping that everyone can have a conversation and laugh together,” Maroon said. “It’s about making positive connections between people. It is all part of the human experience and using your imagination. It is kind of cool to bring people into something that you love in a really relaxed setting.”

Art is a way of life for Isabella Maroon, LaLomia said, who has a grit and resolve that most people her age don’t have.

“I love that she is growing and learning,” LaLomia said. “She has a discerning eye. She retools and repurposes materials. I’ve watched her pour her heart into building her studio and business, a true testament to her dedication and resolve. Bella is an exceptionally talented artist I’ve had the joy of knowing since she was born. I had the privilege of teaching her and watching her grow into a creative, thoughtful young artist. Now Bella is the one teaching me.”

Maroon has taught classes at Sewickley Academy and instructing young people inspired her to want to offer learning opportunities in her studio. Her work has been featured at Wasserman Projects in Detroit, Sullivan galleries in Chicago, locally at Eberle Studios in Homestead and at Carpenters Workshop Gallery in New York City.

JoAnne Klimivich Harrop | TribLive Artist Isabella Maroon of Sewickley places a sculptural vase inside a kiln at her studio in Leetsdale Industrial Park on Nov. 3. She has taught classes at Sewickley Academy and her work has been featured at Wasserman Projects in Detroit, Sullivan galleries in Chicago, locally at Eberle Studios in Homestead and at Carpenters Workshop Gallery in New York City.  

She is collaborating with Mark Rengers of Mark Rengers Gallery in Sewickley for an upcoming exhibition of her work.

“Getting your hands dirty, you see the transformation it takes,” said Maroon. “There’s something about the ability to take raw materials and transform them into something tangible and meaningful. I discovered endless possibilities emerge when creativity meets clay and fire. My head feels lighter and I can be in the moment. Something we rarely have the chance for in today’s society.”

And she still has the caterpillar she made — it’s at her mom’s house in Franklin Park.

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