The Massillon Museum’s Studio M features A Fair Trade—weaving by Stephen Torero and ceramics by Grant Ederer—from November 16, 2024 through January 5, 2025. 

In this exhibition, Grant Ederer and Stephen Tornero communicate through their respective disciplines using a shared visual language of shape and color. Artists are often inspired by other artists' work. Like a dream that recycles the experiences of each day, an artwork sometimes accumulates the residue of a visual memory within itself. Unintentionally, references to images, objects, and other artworks appear.

In Tornero and Ederer’s disciplines, the artists take the roles of master crafter and studio assistant: planning an artwork, then carrying out the manual labor to achieve the final product. In weaving, many different threads and yarns are interlocked to form a cloth matrix. In ceramics, the molecules of clay and silica are arranged in a crystalline structure to make a vessel. In both, the small pieces create objects that are more than the sum of their parts. 

Ederer and Tornero traded a series of artworks and objects to create a point of inspiration for the artwork seen in this show. Building from a shared love of their craft, color, and shape, a body of work sprung from these inspiration points. In conversations and critiques, the work took new paths not foreseen in the initial vision of the show, as each artist uncovered new meanings. Through this creative collaboration, the artists were pushed in new directions. As a result, the artworks in this exhibition show an inherent connection to one another, building on relationships discovered throughout the process. 

“Whether they are viewed as a trade or a method of making fine art, it is important to hold space for these traditional crafts while pushing the boundaries of creativity,” Tornero says. 

While ceramics and weaving can be used to create a variety of objects from the useful to the purely aesthetic, they require training and practice to master. Both artists enjoy creating work that juxtaposes the traditional usefulness of the craft with the aesthetic intent of an art object. 

Stephen Tornero is a textile artist and art teacher from Canton, Ohio. His weavings focus on using color with dye and resist techniques to create patterns on the surface of the cloth. Using a mixture of traditional techniques with nontraditional methods, he creates artwork that pushes textiles as an art form while maintaining their connection to the past. Tornero has shown in Ohio and Pennsylvania, and was awarded “Best in Show” at the Massillon Museum’s 2023 Stark County Artists Exhibition. He was awarded the “Art Teacher of the Year” award for Stark County, and the “Outstanding Art Teacher” award from the Ohio Art Education Association. Tornero has curated group textile shows for multiple galleries in Northeast Ohio. He teaches art to middle school students and art education courses at Kent State University. 

Grant Ederer is a ceramicist living and working in Akron, Ohio. After discovering an affinity for making things and working with clay in high school, he studied industrial design at Pratt Institute. This background fostered the functional, sculptural, and tactile characteristics of his work and craft. He uses a wide variety of techniques to develop forms and surfaces, including wheel throwing, hand building, mold making, and slip casting. Ederer’s casting techniques ensure unique subtle variations in patterns and details, as pebbles from a stream are similar yet distinctive. He is inspired by biomorphic forms, the regularity of geometric patterns, and those patterns’ juxtaposition with architectural lines and elements. Ederer is meticulous about his surfaces and glaze-masking process. He uses areas of bare clay, often burnished to the point they beg to be touched. His use of color is inspired by the gradients found in plants, animals, and entire landscapes.