Michelle Solorzano

Michelle Solorzano is a figurative ceramic sculptor whose work explores themes of immigration, identity, and culture, interweaving personal narrative with broader historical and ancestral influences. Originally from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, she moved to New York with her family at the age of fifteen. Her art practice is deeply rooted in the complexities of bicultural identity and the layered legacies of colonization, shaped by Dominican heritage—Taíno, African, and Spanish.

Solorzano holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting and Ceramics from the State University of New York at Potsdam and a Master of Fine Arts in Ceramics from Indiana University’s Eskenazi School of Art, Architecture + Design. Though she has been making art since childhood—using discarded materials, paper mâché, and drawing to bring her ideas to life—it wasn’t until her second year of undergraduate studies that she touched clay for the first time. That first ceramics course prompted her to switch majors from Art Education to Fine Arts, solidifying her commitment to ceramics. She was immediately drawn to the malleability, versatility, and forgiving nature of clay, which remains central to her sculptural practice.

Now based in California, Solorzano is a long-term Artist in Residence at the American Museum of Ceramic Art (AMOCA), where she also shares her passion for ceramics through teaching. Her work has been recognized nationally, most recently as a 2025 NCECA Emerging Artist and a recipient of the Helen Zucker Seeman Writing and Research Fellowship for Women. She was named a 2024 Ceramics Monthly Emerging Artist, and has also received the Bloomington Arts Commission Emerging Artist Grant, the Christyl Ann Boger Memorial Award, and the Nelda Christ Memorial Award.

Visit Michelle Solorzano’s website and Instagram page.