Mayumi was born in Osaka, Japan. When she was three years old she started studying ballet until she moved to Utah, in 1990.  She began teaching ballet at the Center Stage Dance Academy, Ohio in 1998.   She has taught Japanese and English for nearly 20 years.  She attended school while working full-time and during her engineering pro- gram, she fell in love with clay and the process of making clay arts, which she has done for thirteen years.

Mayumi helps students with wheel throwing, hand building, pinch, coil, and sculpted ceramics and mold-making.   She teaches both commercial and natural glazes, func- tional ceramics (cups, bowls, plates, etc.), and instructs small and mid-sized sculpture (human forms, abstract and altered forms).  Due to her unusually deep experience in artist in residency programs, she can assist those who are considering vocational, pro- fessional or teaching options in ceramics.

Her ceramics lineage is from the Volkous-Balistreri-Sheets line, and she received her BFA in 2012 from Ohio Northern University. Since then, she has studied in Japan, Ko- rea, Ohio and France, and is currently in the final year of her Masters of Fine Arts in Oklahoma.

Mayumi’s work has received over 40 awards, and is included in permanent collections
in a number of museums and private collections.