It was a great day for those who love to create with clay. On July 12, the Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts in Newcastle celebrated its 20th Salad Days Festival.

The celebration was filled with ceramic art exhibits, music, food and games. The festival is the major fundraiser for the Watershed Center, which provides a place for up and coming ceramists to focus on their craft. Each year, ceramists come to Watershed to focus on their art for a solid two-week period. Watershed Center trustee John Washburn of Wiscasset said the Watershed Center is a world renowned place where artists come to explore new ideas and techniques.

“It’s where they come to work on their art without interruption,” Washburn said. “This place is internationally known and draws people from all over the country. The artists can focus on their art, meet with other artists and for a two-week period concentrate solely on ceramic art.”

Salad Days began in 1995 to support the two-week residency program. The organizers wanted to host an event that tied together the art program with locally produced food. The annual event features various ceramic products sold on the grounds, and food grown locally or donated by local restaurants.

“Salad Days really ties the art and food together,” said Beth Kendall, president of the Watershed Center board of trustees. “The term refers to a time when a person’s life was good and happy. And that’s what we want to convey here. It’s a happy time to celebrate both the arts and locally produced food.”

The main event is the selling of 500 ceramic plates produced by Watershed’s 2014 Salad Days Artist of the Year Jessica Brindl. She is a Nebraska native who earned a master’s degree in fine arts from Ohio State University and a bachelor’s degree in fine arts from the Kansas City Art Institute. She spent three months last summer producing 500 plates, which were sold for $35 a piece during the festival. She said focusing on creating 500 plates in a three-month period aided her development as an artist.

“Before I came to Watershed, producing 500 plates seemed like a daunting task,” Brindl said. “The plates from prior Salad Days really served as an inspiration to me. The plates with their fluid movements and shapes and patterns in the rough, imperfection of raw clay really inspired me to do my best work. This was a truly worthwhile experience and helped me grow as an artist.”

While Brindl’s work is done, the 2015 Salad Days Artist Stuart Gair, of Hudson, Ohio, work is only beginning. During the festival, Gair was in the middle of his three-month stint working in the Watershed studios producing 500 plates for next year’s festival. Gair uses his education as a history major at Ohio University to enhance his ceramic art. In the fall, he begins graduate studies at the University of Nebraska.

“I heard about Watershed from my professors. They thought the experience would benefit me by exploring surface art. And what better way to do that than produce 500 plates,” Gair said.

Besides allowing the artist time to work on their own, the residency programs allows the residents to meet and discuss their craft with other ceramic artists.

“This is a place where careers are made and friendships and bonds are created,” said Watershed adviser David East. “The artists share an experience and their ideas about creating great art with each other other. It’s truly a remarkable experience for a young artist.”

The festival also provided a learning opportunity for the public. Guest artist Robbie Lobell along with Sam Hayward, the owner of Fore Street Restaurant in Portland, presented “Cooking on Clay.” The presentation features best demonstrated practices for using ceramic cookware in varying temperatures. The second demonstration featured Trevor Dunn of Florida who discussed how to build an outdoor wood-fired pizza oven.

Originally Watershed was the site of a brick factory. The previous owners hauled a large pile of clay to the site for manufacturing the bricks. After a few years, the business failed. A local group looking to support the arts decided to convert the facility into an institute. Thus, the Watershed Center for the Arts was created. Besides the two-week residency program, which has between 14-25 members each summer session, the center also has a three-week program, a three-month program for the Salad Days Artist of the Year, and it’s open year-round as a place for local artists to use.