Ceramics artists sold empty bowls at a Carbondale grocery store on Saturday to help feed the hungry through a partnership that has been running for the last three years with an area soup kitchen.

Customers visiting the Neighborhood Co-op Grocery were greeted by a table of artistic ceramic bowls priced between $5 and $15. Proceeds from the sales went toward Good Samaritan Ministries of Carbondale and could be used to serve hundreds of meals, said Patty Mullen, the ministry’s assistant director.

“We fed 33,000 meals last fiscal year,” she said, speaking of the year-round efforts the soup kitchen provides. “The cost to run the soup kitchen for the year was $134,000, which includes the value of donated foods.”

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Mullen said the fundraiser has raised more than $5,000 during the past two years.

Pattie Chalmers, an associate professor SIU’s art and design school who helped coordinate the event, said the program is part of an international effort taken on by ceramics students to help the homeless.

“Students often feel that they can’t make a difference in the world and this is an opportunity for them to see that they can do good in their own community,” Chalmers said.

Chalmers said they plan to continue this as an annual fall event and the uncertainty of the state’s finances makes it all the more important to continue donating to the program.

“The need is even greater because of decreased state support and so our goal is always to sell all the bowls,” she said.

Staff writer Shyanne Jasper can be reached at 618-536-3325, [email protected] or on Twitter @sjasper_DE.

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