about j.e. paterak [she/her/hers]

J.E. Paterak studied at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan and Massachusetts College of Art. She has been working in various modalities as artist, jeweler, metalsmith, painter. Additionally her interests cover a multitude of interests including a short time as a cultural catalyst (co-founder of CitizenSalon), former guerrilla gardener, former Architalx board member. Currently she is acting curator & programing director at Zero Station Gallery. She continues her informal education as a naturalist/amateur botanist and mycologist and holds several certificates related to the study of plants and landscape.

Her paintings and jewelry are in numerous private collections throughout the country as well as in public collections most notably at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Both her writing and work have been published in American Craft, Metalsmith Magazine and several Lark Books and Brynmorgen Press books. She has been awarded grants from Maine Arts Comission, as well as residencies at Monson Arts, Fiore Center, Bowdoin’s Kent Island Science Station among others.

She is a co-owner of Zero Station Gallery in the East Bayside neighborhood of Portland. Zero Station is an independent gallery with a creative legacy celebrating TWENTY FIVE years this January 2025. She lives and works with Keith Fitzgerald (co-owner of Zero Station) in Portland, and has life long ties to midcoast Maine.