In the Details

Brother Thomas Bezanson graduated in 1950 from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and in 1968 received an MA in Philosophy from the University of Ottawa. In 1953, he began working as a potter and six years later entered the Benedictine Monastery in Weston, Vermont, where he spent 25 years as a potter. In 1976, Thomas was a visiting lecturer at Alfred University School of Ceramics and in 1983, was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts grant. During his time at the Benedictine Monastery, Thomas traveled to Japan, where he met five Living National Treasure potters appointed by the Japanese Government. These craftsmen deeply influenced Thomas's work, process, and thought. It was a few years after this influential journey that he felt the need for greater artistic freedom and left the monastery in 1984 to become an artist-in-residence in the community of Benedictine Sisters in Erie, Pennsylvania, where he shared his life and art for 22 years. Brother Thomas’s elegant forms are completed by a vivid array of glazes, which he created from natural materials. His works are in numerous galleries and museums, and are included in over 80 international collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.