Niwot artist handcrafts mugs for virtual Sunrise Stampede winners

The Sunrise Stampede is one of the many local events to be impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. Despite everything, the 35th annual race will still be held this weekend on Aug 6-8, albeit virtually.

While the participants will not be able to gather all together, one thing hasn't changed for the 2020 Sunrise Stampede: the awards. Local Niwot artist and craftsperson Mark Rossier is once again creating hand-thrown pottery mugs to give out to race winners and participants.

The race managers, Alison and Peter Richards, reached out to Rossier for the first time 10 years ago, so he is celebrating a milestone year with the event, as well. This will be Rossier's tenth year in a row designing and throwing a run of mugs. In 2020, he is making 55 mugs, down from the usual 155 for the live race event.

Every year, Alison creates custom artwork, and, "We work together to see how I can put that artwork on mugs with stamps," said Rossier in a recent socially-distanced Zoom interview.

"This year, they wanted it to say 'virtual'" and so with the smaller run and the special marking, this year the mugs are somewhat different, perhaps more special than usual.

"With fewer pieces, I feel a little freer to make them slightly more elaborate," said Rossier. "I noticed the mugs are a little larger."

"It's sort of hard to explain," Rossier continued, "but part of what happens when you're working with the clay, you just kind of see what the form is that seems to be coming out. It's a subtle thing."

Rossier works with clay from a manufacturer in Denver. While some pottery artists find and extract their own "wild clay" through a time and labor intensive process, "There's a lot of it in Colorado" Rosier said. He has worked with developed clay bodies from the same company for many years.

He usually does all of his work in a dark brown clay, but for this event, he always works with a white clay.

"I don't use white clay very much," Rossier said. Rossier also makes the stamps by hand from Alison's artwork every year, and said, "I really like that, it's a fun process to do."

His background is unique among pottery artists, in that he apprenticed himself at two separate production pottery studios.

On his website, Rossier speaks of this way of learning, saying, "I wouldn't trade that experience for anything. I tell students all the time that if they want to learn how to make pots, they should make the same pot over and over again to understand the subtleties of that form. Get quick at it. Don't overwork a piece, make another."

Rossier doesn't often get to do large runs of a particular product, like the Sunrise Stampede mugs, so he enjoys going back to his roots.

Every once in a while, someone will wander into Rossier's Niwot shop and tell him that they have a mug from every year of the Stampede.

This is one thing that Rossier really likes about creating pottery, that "people are using my things all the time and they get very attached to them - particularly a mug. I love when those stories trickle back."