Miki Shim is on her second career as a ceramic artist after a 25+ years in marketing and graphic design in Chicago, IL. Since the move to California in 2012, her path has taken her work internationally, promoting artists locally through visiting artist programs, and producing ceramics focus tours to South Korea.

Miki’s work can be seen throughout US, China, and South Korea through private collections, juried exhibitions and galleries, and also travel to teach, present, and demonstrate ceramics to a wide audience.

Locally, she focuses on teaching Bay Area clay enthusiasts through various private studios, community centers. Miki is an active member and past board member of Orchard Valley Ceramic Arts Guild (OVCAG) and the Association of Clay and Glass Artists of California (ACGA). 

Miki’s decorative functional pottery has become recognizable by its beautiful surface detail, sensitivity to lightness and proportion, and respect for the Earth and materials drawn from it. While she has successfully explored a wide range of techniques, materials and applications over the years, Shim-Rutter has become well known today particularly for her work related to tea. In 2017 and 2019, she was one of only four American potters invited to participate in the highly respected “Hong Guang Zi Qi” International Ceramic Art Cultural Exchange Week in YiXing, China. Her teapots, tea bowls, jars and trays demonstrate a mastery of not only individual forms but of a holistic approach to the human experience of drinking tea, and they have been juried into many local and international exhibitions over the past six years. 

Miki studied fine arts in ceramics and Visual Communications at Northern Illinois University and received her BA in Advertising Design from Ray College of Design, Chicago, IL. In 2009, following a 25-year professional career in integrative marketing and graphic design, she renewed her passion for clay, relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area, and returned to ceramics full-time. She is living proof that dreams and inspiration do not expire. Please follow her here and look for her work at Bay Area festival venues like the Annual ACAG Clay and Glass Festival in Palo Alto and at other regional, national and international exhibitions.