Sharon Portelance received her BFA in 1982 at the Portland School of Art now Maine College of Art & Design and received her MFA in Metal in 1992 from the State University of New York at New Paltz. Portelance maintains an active studio practice, exhibiting both nationally and internationally. Her work can be viewed in collections that include the Tacoma Art Museum in Tacoma, Washington, The Samuel Dorsky Museum in New Paltz, NY, the Okresni Muzeum Ceskeho Raje in Turnov, Czech Republic and at the Ilias Lalaounis Jewelry Museum in Athens, Greece. Her work has been featured in Ornament Magazine, Metalsmith Magazine, and in the Lark Book publications 1000 Rings and 500 Bracelets. She has been an artist in residence in the Czech Republic, in Estonia at the Estonian Academy of Arts in Tallinn in the United States at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts and has just completed a residency at the Ilias Lalaounis Jewelry Museum in Athens, Greece.
Her latest bodies of work Grey Matter and Reflected Bodies explore the relationship of the body’s interior space and its relationship to nature, while continuing an ongoing investigation into the nature of jewelry and how it can operate both privately and publicly. Portelance has been a Professor and Chair of the Metalsmithing and Jewelry Department at Maine College of Art & Design since 1999.
Funded through the generous support of the Gene R. Cohen Charitable Foundation.