By late afternoon on a Friday, the studio has filled with the easy chatter of four women whose lives are intertwined through family and art. They left Dayton to become artists and came back to remember why, by sharing a Front Street studio as relatives and creative collaborators.
They lived in Queens and Brooklyn - one in Portland - chasing creative work in cities that sharpened their skills, but where they tired of the striving. The ambition remains, but the exhaustion doesn’t. In Dayton, the four artists are rediscovering creativity without the constant pressure to justify it.
Everybody got that?
“I didn’t do much art over the last 15 years in New York because I was more hustling jobs to make a living,” said Trujillo.
It’s a common thread for the group, the return to creativity, and it’s relationship to living in Dayton.
“That’s a big one, affordability, and not schlepping around the city all the time,” said Trujillo.
“We tried to set up some space in apartments,” said LaCava, who lived in Brooklyn with Trujillo and their husbands. Who are brothers.
“It was just never enough space.”
The family tree is a bit confusing for a newcomer, but clearly connected through a web of art, music, and teaching.
Nereida is married to musician Danny Tuss, Jane Tuss’ brother.
“We give each other time to work. He has a couple band nights every week…”
“…with Jess’ husband, David,” added Sells.
“Our husbands are brothers,” clarified LaCava.
“They’re my brothers,” said Tuss.
Everybody got that?
Past work, cut apart
Tuss, at 37, is the baby of the group. She works with her laptop open, sketchbook nearby. Sometimes she’s drawing or painting designs for her job in wall coverings, other times she’s sneaking in her own work focused on weaving with hand-felted details. The studio allows that overlap.
“I’m trying to come at least once a week. Just to get back in the swing of it,” she said.
Credit: Hannah Kasper
Credit: Hannah Kasper
She and LaCava share an art table that once belonged to her mother, Dee Dee Tuss, a Dayton Public School art teacher and fixture in Dayton’s arts community who took classes from Bing Davis. The table surface is layered with decades of printmaking stencils, the residue of a family where art lessons were taught in the kitchen by Tuss’ grandmother, “Gigi”. She was also a DPS art teacher, as was cousin Sells’ mother.
“My interest in textiles comes from her,” said Tuss of her mother.
“A bohemian, artsy family, for sure.”
Lately, Tuss has been pulling out work she made years ago in the textile surface design program at FIT. She takes woven pieces and screen prints and reincorporates them into new projects.
“Things are never finished,” she said.
“I make something and I’m not happy with it, so then I cut it up. I have a lot of ideas that built up in my brain from years ago, projects that I’d like to do.”
For now, the studio is about rediscovering the creative person she was in school — and deciding what parts still fit.
Slow rhythm after the hustle
Trujillo, 42, wedges clay during her lunch break, laptop closed for the hour. She works remotely as the finance and operations director for a New York–based nonprofit, a job she carried with her after moving back to Dayton.
Sometimes she comes to the studio just for a change of scenery — “a little play time.” She fits it in while her 6-year-old is at school.
Credit: Hannah Kasper
Credit: Hannah Kasper
Her sculptures move at a deliberate pace: wedge, shape, wait. Clay has to dry, and kilns fire on their own schedule.
“There’s a lot of ‘sit around and wait,’” she said of the process.
The studio contains three kilns, and she tries to fire once a month. The cadence is the opposite of the life she lived in New York, where she spent years in the work grind.
“I didn’t do much art there,” she said.
Affordability and space brought her to Dayton, but family kept her here. She leans on the studio for something quieter. When she’s unsure about a shape or proportion, she asks LaCava. Crossover between colors and forms in their ceramics and textiles happens naturally.
The return to making
Sells, 42, arrives after the final bell at Northmont, her work day behind her. She comes less often than she’d like, but that regularity matters. Teaching special education takes a particular kind of attention, as does caretaking for her grandfather. The studio is where she tries to make room for herself.
She is easing back in to her own creative life by working in functional clay, creating vases and wall pockets for plants, which she sells in the group’s studio shop on First Fridays.
The pieces are modest, but the act of showing up isn’t.
Credit: Hannah Kasper
Credit: Hannah Kasper
In her classroom, art can be used as a tool for fine and gross motor skills, emotional regulation, and communication. In the studio, it’s her own mindfulness practice. There’s no pressure to produce, only the motivation of eventually filling a kiln.
“This is a place to physically come to force myself to do something creative,” she said.
“It’s my own art therapy.”
Choice and color
LaCava, 40, splits her studio days between her graphic design job and personal art exploration. She opens her laptop to emails, freelance projects, and deadlines, then closes it when her attention drifts toward the pile of fabric scraps waiting nearby.
“My problem is I’m paralyzed by too many choices,” she said.
Quilting, dyeing, printing — what she makes depends on the day and her mood.
Her current experiments start outside. Elderberries harvested from a friend’s yard have produced an unexpected range of color, from seafoam green to deep violet. In her sketchbook, dye swatches are labeled and documented.
“I’m very spontaneous,” she said, “but I like to learn about the science, too.”
Credit: Hannah Kasper
Credit: Hannah Kasper
After years in the fashion and textile industry for brands including The Limited and Merrell, she’s relearning how to make things for herself.
“Working for a brand really takes over and messes with your mind,” she said.
“You’re not really making stuff for yourself.”
It’s also a balancing act with motherhood, caring for her 1 and 6-year-old children.
In the studio, she presses leaves and scans their textures, digitally reworking the nature-inspired imagery. Dialogue in the group helps with momentum.
Happy hour
The four women finish out Friday with a motivational happy hour at the studio.
“I feel like all of us are creative people but resist the usual things about being an artist, like wanting to sell your work, or being really visible on Instagram,” said Tuss.
“Having this studio is a creative outlet more than anything. We don’t necessarily have plans or goals. It’s us getting back into being the creative people we maybe felt like we were a few years ago.”
LaCava concurred.
“Coming back to making stuff for yourself is very therapeutic, and having a group to motivate is the best.”
More info
Jane Tuss: janetuss.com, Instagram: @eeekblob
Nereida Trujillo: Instagram: @ida_ohio
Jess LaCava: jesslacava.com, Instagram: @lavonnes_
The studio includes a small boutique selling handmade pillows, ceramics,and sculptures. It is shoppable on First Fridays, through Instagram and by appointment. Tuss and LaCava are available for commissioned home goods.
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