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American Art Pottery
September 6 - October 25, 2002
It is generally agreed that American art pottery was born in the studios and potteries of Ohio during the last quarter of the
nineteenth century. Art pottery, like the period of its birth, was a combination of aesthetic yearning and pragmatic entrepreunership.
America had recovered from the Civil War, and was in the midst of a period of industrial growth as railroads and canals provided
transportation for both people and goods. They allowed for the easy transportation of the raw materials necessary for the making of
pottery, and when these had been transformed into the finished product, this transcontinental system carried it to all parts of the
country. Art pottery was a national phenomenon, not a localized interest. Potteries sprang up from New England to California, and the
larger establishments shipped their products all across the country, and even abroad.
The growth of the American art tile industry coincided with that of the American art pottery movement, but with few exceptions art
tiles should be regarded as a separate entity. In most cases, the manufacture of art tiles was not carried on by art potteries,
although the two movements are related stylistically. The sudden and energetic enthusiasm for art tiles in the United States was
mirrored by a similar interest worldwide.
The period from 1875 to 1895 saw the establishment of the major tile producers in America: AETCo and Mosaic Tile Company (both of
Zanesville); United States Encaustic Tile Co. (Indianapolis, 1877); the two Low tile companies (1878 and 1883, Chelsea, Massachusetts);
Trent Tile Works (Trenton, New Jersey, 1882); Providential Tile Works (Trenton, 1886); and Beaver Falls Tile Company (Beaver Falls,
Pennsylvania, 1886). These were followed by several others each year, and by art potteries who also began to produce tiles as part of
their art wares (Rookwood, Owens, Newcomb, Weller, Overbeck, and Marblehead, for example).
With the growth of the Arts and Crafts movement in this country, tiles, like pottery, took on a different look. Just as the art potteries
abandoned the dark glossy surfaces of their slip-decorated wares and opted for a matte or vellum surface, so tile companies turned to
matte-glazed tile. Flat, conventionalized designs replaced the naturalistic reliefs. Epitomizing this look are the tiles of William
H. Grueby's pottery.
Grueby had worked for Low Art Tile Works as a young man and in 1894 established his own firm, the Grueby Faience Co., in Boston, where
he produced architectural faience (opaque-glazed decoration) and art pottery. He used native clays from New Jersey and Martha's
Vineyard, whose heavy, grogged bodies resulted in very thick tiles, unlike those who produced by the larger commercial companies.
His glazes, recognized by their quality internationally, were matte, with subtle, subdued colors and blended perfectly with the
prevailing Arts and Crafts style.
While Grueby was altruistically pursuing grace and beauty, the Newcomb Pottery in New Orleans was functioning on a more realistic
level. Newcomb College was the women's division of Tulane University, and its pottery was established precisely to provide training
for women so that they could earn a respectable living. There was the usual division of labor, with men throwing the forms,
developing the glazes, and doing the firing, and the women doing the decorating. Decorative motifs were taken from nature, with the
bayous of Louisiana a favorite subject.
The architectural faience department at Rookwood Pottery began production in 1903, several years after the establishment of the art
pottery division. The department made tiles and garden pottery (often on a very large scale), including urns, window boxes, sundial
pedestals, fountains, etc. The larger, more mechanized companies that specialized in the tile production made competition difficult
for Rookwood, but the company was successful in this area until about 1920, when business declined. Rookwood was not as mechanized
for tile production as these larger establishments, and their cost-profit ratio was much narrower. Rookwood tiles were made only
with matte glazes, but in a wide variety of colors, soft and subtle, and often created for special orders.
Owens and Weller also produced tiles, not surprising since they were centered in the largest tile producing area in the world. J.B.
Owens began to make tiles under the name of the Zanesville Tile Company about 1905. Weller, always in the lead, also produced tiles,
including portrait tiles in relief with monochrome gloss glazes, and pictorial tiles, many of which could be used singly as wall
plaques.
For two seemingly compatible media, it is interesting that as industries pottery and tiles grew in nearly completely different
directions. Whereas the art pottery movement began with handcrafted wares and evolved into mass-production objects, the tile industry
began with mechanized factory production and moved into handmade tiles some years later. In both cases, however, the evolution of
style was similar. The earlier, high-gloss glazed wares gave way to subdued matte glazes as the Arts and Crafts influence was felt
by both industries and each accommodated their production to the prevailing changes in American taste. Art pottery was the first
truly American style, and its appeal remains high today. Rookwood, Roseville, and Weller were the most prolific and are the best
known of the art potteries. Other potteries appeared in Denver and Colorado Springs; Biloxi, Mississippi; Mason City, Iowa;
Cambridge City, Indiana; Benton, Arkansas; and Erlanger, Kentucky. The larger cities such as Chicago, Detroit, New York, New Orleans,
and Boston also were sites for potteries. The movement was a national phenomenon.
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