Grand Valley grad continues long family tradition of teaching
By Mike McKibbin
RIFLE – Gabe Brubacher held an unfinished clay pot in one hand as he made a point to his ceramics students gathered around, each one watching and listening intently.
“He’s very open and creative,” said student Suzie Perryman of Rifle. “He shows you what being an artist can be all about, if you have the patience to cover a lot of ground.”
Brubacher wanted to be a teacher when he attended Grand Valley High School in Parachute, but didn’t realize his life’s calling until he took ceramics to fulfill the requirement for an art class while he pursued his bachelor’s degree.
“I’d always liked the art classes in high school, but they didn’t offer ceramics,” Brubacher said.
Now, he brings three years’ experience teaching ceramics and sculpture at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Ind., to Colorado Mountain College’s West Garfield Campus in Rifle. An adjunct professor of ceramics for much of the past year, Brubacher teaches three courses this fall: Ceramics I and II (three credits each) and a noncredit ceramics open lab.
“I love working with my hands,” he explained. “I’ve always loved the arts, too, and ceramics just drew me more than any other medium.”
Malcolm King of New Castle is a math major at the college’s Spring Valley Center outside Glenwood Springs. He took Brubacher’s ceramics class as an elective for his major.
“He’s a good instructor,” King said. “He explains things in a simple-to-understand way. That way we can get to work easily.”
Full circle from Colorado to Texas, Indiana, back home
A Colorado native, Brubacher studied art education at Adams State College in Alamosa, where he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees, then moved to Irving, Texas, to get his master’s in fine arts at the University of Dallas.
His grandfather, Roy Brubacher, is an outgoing Colorado Mountain College trustee and former Garfield School District 16 board member, following a long education career. Gabe Brubacher’s father, Steve, has taught at Grand Valley High School.
After returning to the area, Gabe Brubacher said he called Colorado Mountain College to see if they needed someone to teach a ceramics class, and they told him they had one opening. And the rest, as they say, is history.
Along with longtime ceramics instructor Steve Chesley, Brubacher teaches classes that usually fill up with about a dozen students. Art shows help students display their work from class, with a winter show planned at the end of fall semester, just before the holiday break, Brubacher added.
Some students in his Ceramics I class this fall had worked with pottery for years; others had never touched clay.
“It’s great stress relief for me,” said Cindy McCain of Silt. She’s taking 17 credits this semester toward her medical assistant certificate.
Prospective students hesitant to enroll out of fear they will not be creative shouldn’t worry, Brubacher said.
“I try to reassure students that it’s not about being an artist, it’s about learning the craft of each medium,” he said. “Once they get that, they usually start to loosen up and you see them grow as an individual in the class. If they put in the effort and show improvement, they’ll do fine.”
“It’s a lot better than a math class,” said student Leo Braun of Parachute.