Ceramic artist Pixie Couch of Menlo Park was the inspiration behind the show. Couch has been making clay boxes for 30 years and finally got around to thinking outside the box. Actually, CouchÕs boxes are magical. Most are small and hand-built with a space carved out of the interior. Some are thrown on the wheel and are round.

ÒIÕm interested in being able to access the interior space from the outside,Ó Couch said, Òso I create tiny windows in the boxes.Ó Couch finishes her boxes in many different techniques; raku, low fire glazed and saggar fired. ÒEach is itÕs own story in clay,Ó she added.

Ceramic artists Karen Truesdell, Susan Wolf and Jeff Carlick add their take on the box theme, too.

Truesdell, also from Menlo Park, has created an array of brightly patterned Òtick tackyÓ houses for the wall. Inspired by the Malvina Reynolds song, they are all the same in form but like the originals, now each has individuality. The patterns continue in games such as tick-tack-toe, Jack in the Boxes and decorative canisters.

ÒI like the idea of art pieces that are touched and moved as well as looked at,Ó Truesdell said. ÒA more complete experience.Ó

Wolf, from Los Altos, has made boxes in little sets. ÒThere is no one theme to them,Ó she said, Òthough I see them as little sculptures.Ó There are a couple of mid-size nautilus boxes, suitable for cotton balls or q-tips, and Wolf has crafted three tiny porcelain box towns. ÒMaybe they could hold paper clips or stamps, or teeny wrapped hard candies,Ó she said. Wolf also has blue porcelain camels with hinged humps and a brown stoneware model with an accompanying bale of Ôgoods.Õ She also has several rectangular unglazed porcelain boxes with glazed accents.

Carlick, from Redwood City, has crafted a series of ÒMemory Boxes,Ó which hang on a wall and have small box opening, which could hold anything thatÕs really small. In the box within a box, he has placed mockettes of his favorite forms of bottles and vases.

Photographer Cheryl Shepard of Redwood City, has several still life images with a crate or box, which are abstracts, made by using directional lighting to bring out forms and lines of boxes and various other containers. The images are archival pigment prints.

Nina Koepcke, of San Jose, sheds her ceramic hat for this show and will present a selection of block prints with the thread of box as subject matter. One piece is titled ÒFlying Lox Box,Ó which depicts block-like fish flying over a city.

Lastly, painter Katinka Hartmetz of Redwood City, has used old wooden molds (for aluminum machinery) and has added a combination of Òshrinky-dinksÓ and found objects inside the molds. One is a music box that is playable. Hartmetz has also constructed small wood boxes that will hang on a wall.