Erik Haagensen

Erik Haagensen graduated from a liberal art university, Georgetown University, Washington DC, with a B.S. in Business Administration. This set him up for a career in enterprise soft ware applications, but the additional coursework in Art History, Studio Arts, Psychology, Philosophy, and Theology fed his appetite for experimenting with the arts. He would go home from his day job and make art, and then in 2001 shifted his primary focus to making ceramics.

With his wife and studio partner, Luba Sharapan, Haagensen set up a large community art studio dedicated to clay in Atlanta, called MudFire Clayworks. For ten years the couple shared their space with over a 100 artists and students at a time, taught every day, produced monthly gallery exhibits, and hosted artists from around the world for workshops. In 2013 Haagesen and Sharapan sold the studio to a group of artist friends and moved to an old farm in Appalachia to focus on their own work.