Bennett Bean Sold at Auction Prices

b. 1941 -

Bennett Bean (born March 25, 1941) is an American ceramic artist. Although commonly described as a studio potter, some would characterize him as a sculptor and painter who works primarily in studio pottery. Bean resides in Frelinghuysen Township, New Jersey. Bean is best known for his pit fired white earthenware vessels, especially his collectible, non-functional bowls and teapots. His ceramics works are often asymmetrical, non-functional, and fluid looking.

Bean was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on March 25, 1941. Bean's father, a medical doctor, was serving in the army at the time of his birth, and went on to become the head of the Department of Internal Medicine at the State University of Iowa (an earlier name for the University of Iowa) in 1949. From that point on, Bean grew up in Iowa City, Iowa.

He attended Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa, but transferred to University of Iowa to pursue his art studies. At the University of Iowa, Bean studied both drawing and painting, but he was drawn to the ceramics department, seduced by the technique of throwing and attracted by the university's ceramics faculty. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1963 from University of Iowa.[5] After a semester of graduate studies at the University of Washington, where Patti Warashina was also a student, Bean moved to California to continue his art studies at the Claremont Graduate School where he studied under artist Paul Soldner. At Claremont he received a Master of Fine Arts degree in 1966.

Bean also met and married fellow Claremont graduate student (of philosophy), Cathy Bao. After graduation, Bean accepted a position teaching ceramics at Wagner College on Staten Island in New York City, where he remained until 1979.