SHELLY BUONAIUTO

Shelley and Michael Buonaiuto met while studying sculpture and painting at the University of Massachusetts in 1968. After a few vagabond years, their spiritual search led them to the study of Gurdjieff, a Greek Caucasian spiritual master, at Chardavogne Barn in New York. There Shelley began to study pottery, making creches and small figures, and Michael, after a few years as a stone mason (in debt to his Italian ancestry) joined her in 1975, after the birth of their first child, Ben. Besides sculpting, Michael was a skilled mold-maker. After a second child, Nina, Michael and Shelley began to dream in Spanish, so they sold their house and headed to South America for seven months before settling in Santa Fe, NM in 1984, where they lived for 23 years. In Santa Fe, they started a cookie jar company, made bronzes and then started a line of bonded porcelain figures, while continuing to work in clay. 

Ben and Sage, his wife, moved to Fayetteville, AR and started their own line of art. Three years later Michael, Shelley and Mia, their third child, followed them there. In Fayetteville, Shelley and Michael have a larger studio and work in clay, bronze and resin. Their large bronzes “Alternative Energies” were commissioned for a park in Loveland, CO and “Wind” from that series won Best of Show at The Rivermarket Show in Little Rock in 2007. Shelley spends several months a year producing new one-of-a-kind clay pieces.