About the Studio
The Marmarellis Fager Studio
804 South Newport Avenue
Tampa, Florida 33606
Joan Marmarellis
A Master of Fine Arts Graduate of the University of South Florida, Joan also holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Art Education and Master Degree in Studio Arts from Adelphi University in Garden City, Long Island, where she also received her Bachelors Degree in Art Education. Ms. Marmarellis attended Penland School of Crafts in North Carolina for a year of study in ceramics. In 1979 she received a Master of Fine Arts Degree in Sculpture and Ceramics from the University of South Florida. That same year, the State of Florida awarded her an Individual Artist Fellowship Award. The National Endowment for the Arts chose her as Artist in Residence for a Pilot Program at one of five selected VA hospitals in the United States.
She has taught courses in Art for the Child as an adjunct professor in USF’s College of Education.
Ms. Marmarellis has exhibited nationally with works included in many collections such as the Polk Museum of Arts, The State of Florida Art in State Buildings and The Greek Ortodox Archdiocese in New York. She has been written about in numerous publications including Charlotte Speight’s book Images in Clay Sculpture, and periodicals such as Art News, Art Papers and Ceramics Monthly. Lately most of her work has been in the realm of public art where she has been collaborating with her husband, nationally known sculptor, Charles Fager.
Charles and Joan produced the Memorial for Angelo and Lee Bruno, at Bruno Corporate Headquarters, Birmingham, Alabama in 1992. Other projects include the Hillsborough County Art in Public Places Courthouse Cistern Project, an educational water conservation project; a ninety foot, “fossilized” wall for the entry of the South Regional Library in Lee County, Florida and a trip to Alaska to create Kaleidoscopic Passage for the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District.
Charles Fager
Charles Fager, awarded Professor Emeritus at the University of South Florida (1999) received a Bachelor of Architecture from Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas; and a Master of Fine Art from the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas. In 1963, he began to create the highly recognized ceramics program at the University of South Florida where he taught 3-D design, sculpture and ceramics until 2001.
Professor Fager has had the honor of winning a number of major national public art competitions such as one for General Telephone & Electronics of Florida and three for the State of Florida Art in State Buildings Program. He was chosen to exhibit in the Alabama Biennial National Site Specific Sculpture Invitational. The Townscape Institute of Cambridge Massachusetts selected him as an Artist's Charrette team member to develop the Master Plan of the Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority (HARTline) Public Art Program. Other accomplishments include a Florida Individual Artist Fellowship, and inclusion in collections such as The National Collection of Fine Art, Tampa Museum of Art, Stetson University Permanent Collection, Wichita Museum of Art, Barnett Bank, Sun Bank and The Paragon Group Collection.
The works of Professor Fager have been exhibited at many institutions including the Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian, Washington, D.C., The Museum of Contemporary Crafts, New York City, The Long Beach Museum of Art, California, The Mint Museum of Art, North Carolina and The National Museum of Lima, Peru. Publications include American Porcelain: New Expressions in an Ancient Art, by Lloyd Herman, Who's Who in American Art, Screenprinting History and Process, by Donald Saff and Deli Sacilotto, Keramos by Franz F. Kriwanek, and Images in Clay Sculpture, by Charlotte Speight, The Smithsonian Magazine, ARTWEEK, American Craft, Ceramics Monthly and ART PAPERS.