Robert L. “Bob” Owens

Robert L. “Bob”Owens founded the UNG Fine Arts Department and served as Fine Arts Department chair for 26 years from 1971-1997. The school was known as North Georgia College during this time before the conversion to University status. Owens was an artist and art educator. During his artistic career he had a tremendous impact on many art/craft organizations and individuals in the southeast.

Bob Owens was a master potter and sculptor whose work is treasured by many collectors. He designed and created works of particular significance for UNG which include the bronze eagle on the “Freedom’s Vigil” monument on the Dahlonega campus Memorial, the official bronze UNG Mace that is carried at academic ceremonies and the bronze Presidential Medallion worn by the UNG President as part of the academic regalia.

Owens lived most of his life in Georgia and was a resident of White County. Born in 1939,Owens graduated from Young Harris College with an Associate of Arts degree, then a Bachelor of Arts in Art Education from the University of Georgia (UGA) in 1962. He taught art in the Clark County School System in Athens from 1962-1965 while working toward his Masters in Fine Arts degree in Ceramics at UGA which he received in 1965.

In 1965 Owens became a part time art instructor at North Georgia College (NGC) and the following year he was hired as a full time instructor. It was during this time that he began an arts program to include both visual art and music.

Simultaneously he established Owens Pottery, Inc. in 1966, a pottery and sculpture production studio and sales gallery at his home. Owens maintained an extensive exhibit schedule through the years. He was a dedicated production potter who produced thousands of functional pottery pieces. The elements of the North Georgia mountains landscape were featured prominently in Bob Owens’ work in both slip painted pottery and in sculptural ways. He kept elaborate sketchbooks throughout his life. During this period he was selected as a juried member of the Southern Highland Craft Guild. He later became an elected member of the Board of Trustees for the Guild.

In 1971, at age 32, Owens was appointed Department Chair for the newly formed NGC Fine Arts Department. At NGC, Bob Owens provided leadership in developing degree programs in several art and music areas as well as a Masters in Art Education degree. His leadership extended from the renovation of the campus dining hall in order to secure an endowment for programming in a new Fine Arts facility called the Nix Mountain Cultural Center. His artistic output over the years was remarkable, especially considering the active work schedule that he maintained at NGC, in his local community, the state and the southeastern region.

Over the years, Owens built many alliances and some of those led to enhanced funding for the Department of Fine Arts. In 1998, Mr. and Mrs. Hal Rhodes made a donation of $100,000 as seed money to establish the Bob Owens Professorship in Pottery and Sculpture at UNG.

Service was important to Owens. He held leadership roles in the Georgia Art Education Association, Georgia Mountain Crafts, Very Special Arts Georgia, Georgia Citizens for the Arts and the Georgia Council for the Arts. In 1985 Owens received the Governor’s Award in the Arts and was selected as Georgia Art Educator of the Year by the Georgia Art Education Association in 1987.

Bob made highly significant contributions to the arts in the Southeast. He influenced innumerable students at North Georgia College. Many of those students were art education majors and they in turn had an effect on thousands of students in the state. Following his retirement in 1997 he continued to teach exceptional instruction in pottery at Piedmont College and the John C. Campbell Folk School and his work with many other art/craft organizations gave impact.

Bob Owens was a rare example of a creative individual who saw beyond himself and his own work to the larger community. He knew that each individual had something creative within and he had the gift to bring that creativity out of everyone. He brought out the best in everyone and at the same time created exceptional art works of his own which reflected his spirit from utilitarian pottery to the most complex bronze sculpture.

Bob Owens died on April 8, 2004 at the age of 65. He was married to wife Gwen for 43 years and had two sons Ben and Robert.