Midland Center Serves Up Creativity and Community at Empty Bowls

Oct. 17 fundraiser pairs handmade pottery with local flavors to support hunger relief

A handmade bowl can do more than hold soup. It can help put food on a neighbor’s table. That’s the idea behind Empty Bowls, returning Oct. 17 to Midland Center for the Arts.

Presented by the Center’s Studio School, the annual fundraiser invites guests to choose a handmade bowl to take home and enjoy a soup-and-bread buffet from local restaurants and bakeries. Proceeds benefit the Midland County Food Assistance Network, supporting hunger relief in the region.

The tradition began in a Michigan classroom. In 1990, art teacher John Hartom and fellow educator Lisa Blackburn developed Empty Bowls at Lahser High School in Bloomfield Hills. Students made ceramic bowls for a fundraising soup lunch, and guests kept the bowls as a reminder of people facing hunger in their community. That simple pairing of pottery and a shared meal grew into an international movement.

The Center’s part in that story began in 2023. Working with the Food Bank of Eastern Michigan, the Center launched Build-A-Bowl, and its ceramic artists donated their bowls to the Food Bank’s Empty Bowls fundraiser.

Build-A-Bowl returned in 2024, and the Center introduced its own Empty Bowls event that year. What began as a donation of pottery had become a local gathering, with artists, restaurants and guests each contributing something to the table.

“I wanted to give our ceramics community a way to use what we love to help people right here at home,” said Bobbi Nova, Midland Center's Fine Arts Programming Manager, whose vision inspired the local event. “Every bowl represents someone’s time and care. Then a guest chooses that bowl, sits down for a meal and adds their own contribution. That’s the part that means so much to me: all of these people, doing something together for neighbors they may never meet.”

This year’s Build-A-Bowl took place Aug. 22 and 23 at the Carriage House Ceramics Studio. The August gathering was one step in a longer process. Ceramic artists are continuing to glaze the bowls, getting each piece ready for the October fundraiser. The bowl a guest takes home will carry that work with it, a lasting reminder of the people and purpose behind the meal.

The event takes place from 11 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 17, in the Center’s Community Rooms. Tickets are $35 and include a handmade bowl and the buffet during a 90-minute seating. Guests can choose a seating beginning at 11 a.m., 12:30 p.m. or 2 p.m.

Empty Bowls is sponsored by Health Advantage Credit Union.

Tickets are available at midlandcenter.org/emptybowls. Midland Center for the Arts is at 1801 W. St. Andrews Road in Midland.