From the early days of his childhood, the hills, orchards, streams and woodlands of Maryland-based designer Jeffrey Lloyd Dever’s small town infused his aesthetics, and his works are sculptural studies in homage to that natural wonderland. Each of his pieces starts as a series of sketches exploring a concept, a notion or merely a whim. These sketches mature into three-dimensional shapes that form a base to build upon, for example using polymer clay. Each piece grows, layer by layer, through repeated cycles of fabrication and oven-curing. The colors you see are the actual colors of the clay, and the patterns and lines are carved or incised details backfilled with contrasting colors of clay and cured at each stage. Dever holds a BS in Fine Art from Atlantic Union College. He taught illustration and graphic design on the adjunct faculty of Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore for twenty years.