Born in 1942 in Manchester, England, Thomas "Tony" Hepburn was a sculptor, educator, and writer. He was widely recognized for his conceptual contributions to the field of ceramics. Hepburn studied at the Camberwell College of Arts, where he was a student under potter Hans Coper, and later at London University. He went on to write a column called “Letters from London” for Craft Horizons magazine from 1967 to 1970. This written exposure introduced him to ceramic contemporaries in the United States, including Peter Voulkos and Ken Price. He taught in England for several years before accepting a position as a visiting artist at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1974. From there, he went on to Alfred University, where he served as a professor of ceramics from 1976 until 1992. He would finish out his teaching years at Cranbrook Academy of Art, where he maintained an open and reciprocal approach to working with students until his retirement in 2008. Throughout his career, Hepburn fostered a critical engagement with clay, considering its materiality, historical significance, and role in contemporary art. Hepburn garnered many awards throughout his life, including from the New York State Council on the Arts (1986 and 1990) and the National Endowment for the the Arts in 1985. His work is represented within various public collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in California. He was elected a Fellow of the American Craft Council in 2008, and died at his home in Chicago, Illinois, in 2015.