Tyler Sundsmo

Artist

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Tyler was introduced to ceramics at a young age in his early elementary school days on the Key Peninsula, Washington where he grew up on a tree farm close to the coast and spent much of his time outdoors. Growing up he loved to sculpt mythical and sea creatures like dragons and sharks and making pottery pieces for an assortment of relatives that display these works to this day, taking it year after year until high school where he was blessed to study under the gifted Christine Tabor Buchanan at Peninsula High School learning to turn clay on a wheel and taking his art to a higher level. Having successfully shown and sold art work before graduating he had hoped to pursue it in college but after 9/11, having just graduated high school, Tyler felt compelled to enlist to help in the navy and paused his life at home. During bootcamp he was encouraged to go into corpsman school where he graduated first in his class, thus starting a successful career in medicine. Tyler served 5 years in the United States Navy as a Marine Corpsman during which he met Lark, and upon being discharged was enrolled at Tacoma Community College and Washington University School of Nursing Science where he graduated top of his class with his BSN all with infants in tow. It was years later, during his undergraduate, after being discharged from the Navy, Tyler was able to resume his ceramics as an elective for college and then between classes and working multiple jobs to support his young family. It was during this time he enlisted Lark’s help in glazing his works and Point Defiance Pottery was the moniker dubbed the heap of glazes and fired pots that took over their dining room table. It hasn’t been an easy road. Struggling with PTSD since his military service, he uses ceramics as a mode of therapy that both helps ground him to the earth with his fingers in clay and center him as he turns each piece on the wheel. These days when he isn't off seeing patients all over the country as a specialized infusion nurse, he is spending time with his family gardening, cooking, playing, or making memories in clay.