Meet Our Instructors

Rio Rewards PMC^® Certification classes are taught by world-class, respected experts in the industry. They bring to the classroom extensive experience and breadth of knowledge, allowing them to present a challenging and fun curriculum. Committed to the industry and education, our senior PMC instructors look forward to sharing it all with you!

Tim McCreight
Perhaps one of the first artists in the U.S. to use Precious Metal Clay^® and a consultant for the Mitsubishi Materials Corporation (makers of PMC), Tim has worked extensively with the material for nine years. He has written numerous books—including The Complete Metalsmith and Working with Precious Metal Clay—several publication articles and scores of reviews. Over the last two decades, Tim has taught more than 60 workshops, participated in more than 100 exhibitions, and performed a number of lectures all over the country. He is the past president of the Society of North American Goldsmiths and a former professor and department head at Maine College of Art in Portland, Maine. Today he continues to teach metalsmithing all over the country.

CeCe Wire
CeCe anxiously pursued creating with PMC^® the moment the material was made publicly available in 1996. She has been teaching PMC workshops since 1997 and is a former director for the PMC Guild. CeCe is an international exhibitor and instructor and has held teaching positions at the University of Northern Colorado, Colorado State University and AIMS Community College in Greeley, where she earned an Adjunct Faculty Award for Excellence in Teaching. She is the author of Creative Metal Clay Jewelry: Techniques, Projects, Inspiration.

Celie Fago
Regarded among her peers as an innovator in the combination of PMC^® with polymer clay and metal, Celie has designed using PMC since she was first introduced to the material in 1998. During that same year, she was invited by Tim McCreight to become Mitsubishi Materials Corporation’s PMC liaison to the polymer community and was subsequently appointed senior instructor for the PMC Guild. She has authored numerous articles on PMC and polymer clay, co-authored the book Polymer Clay: Exploring New Techniques and New Materials, and recently released the book Keum-Boo on Silver. She has also appeared alongside McCreight in the video Push Play for PMC! Besides hosting workshops for the Rio Rewards PMC Certification Program, Celie holds 1-2 semi-private workshops a year at her studio in central Vermont.

J. Fred Woell
Having taught technique-based jewelry workshops for more than 30 years, J. Fred Woell brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to the Rio Rewards PMC^® Certification Program. In addition, he spent 16 years teaching Art Metals at the collegiate level, including positions at Boston University and the University of Wisconsin at Whitewater, where he founded the school’s Metals program. Fred has worked with PMC since 1995, using the material to create jewelry and other wearable art, as well as found-object sculpture. He authored the article “Opinion: On Justifying Art” which appeared in the 2004 Fall edition of Metalsmith Magazine, and numerous other publications have featured Fred’s creations. He received an award in 1995 from the American Crafts Council, and in 2001, his work was recognized in the Smithsonian “Archives of American Art.”

Barbara Simon
Recognized for both her metalwork and her glasswork, Barbara has been a jeweler and teacher for more than 35 years. She has held teaching positions at Iowa State University, University of Wisconsin-Stout, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Silver Lake College in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, and Edison Community College in Fort Myers, Florida. She has worked with PMC for eight years and she conducts PMC workshops both nationally and internationally. Her work has appeared in Lapidary Journal and in fellow Rio Rewards PMC Certification Program senior instructor CeCe Wire’s book Creative Metal Clay Jewelry: Techniques, Projects, Inspiration. In 2001, Barbara’s necklace “Winter” earned the grand prize in the “Millennial Metal, The Art of Precious Metal Clay” competition held in Brookfield, Connecticut.

Chris Darway
Chris has been working in metals for almost 30 years as a teacher and a designer. Exhibited internationally in Japan, Germany and England, his work has also been shown at the Smithsonian and other galleries nationally. In addition to the certification classes Chris teaches for the Rio Rewards Program, he holds PMC workshops at his studio in Lambertville, New Jersey, where he also produces jewelry and metal work. He has received numerous awards for his creations, including Honorable Mention at the 2001 “Millennial Metal, The Art of Precious Metal Clay” competition held in Brookfield, Connecticut. Currently, Chris is a senior instructor teaching metals at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.

Terry Kovalcik
Since receiving his PMC certification in 2000, Terry has been actively teaching classes, demonstrations and workshops. His work has been recognized numerous times among the PMC community and was featured in CeCe Wire's book Creative Metal Clay Jewelry: Techniques, Projects, Inspiration. Terry has been a professional illustrator for more than 25 years.

Jeanette Landenwitch
Jeanette has been the Executive Director of the PMC Guild since January, 2005. She has been teaching PMC workshops since 2000, has written various magazine articles on PMC and authored Creating with Precious Metal Clay, published in 2002. Jeanette is an international exhibitor whose work has been purchased and is part of the permanent collection of PMC pieces at Mitsubishi Materials Corporation in Japan. She is a juried member of the Kentucky Craft Marketing Program, the American Crafts Council, Society of North American Goldsmiths (SNAG), the Enamellist Society and the Washington Guild of Goldsmiths.

Tonya Davidson
Tonya has extensive experience in various mixed media, which includes fibers, glass, PMC, contemporary ceramics, metalsmithing and bead-weaving. She has developed her own line of clay beads, Bisque Bead Blanks, to integrate with PMC and has had numerous articles published in industry trade journals.