Esoteric Survey

Architectural Pottery: Ceramics for a Modern Landscape Curated by Jo Lauria, at AMOCA Jo, Dan Chavkin, Jeffrey Head, Gary Wexler and the AMOCA team put together a wonderful exhibition. Displaying this many pots is not an easy undertaking. The wall graphics and photos are great as well. It all started with La Gardo Tackett in 1949.  Tackett assigned his students at the California School of Art to create forms for modern homes. They held an exhibition of their work at a Evans & Reeves nursery, where Max and Rita (pictured with Tackett above) Lawrence saw the work. In 1950, the Lawrences partnered with two of the students, John Follis and Rex Goode, on a company they named Architectural Pottery.   LaGardo Tackett with a group of his designed Totems; Photo: George Szanik, 1957 Courtesy of Monacelli Press from the accompanying book, Architectural Pottery Ceramics for a Modern Landscape.   by Daniel Chavkin, Jeffrey Head, and Jo Lauria From the collection of JF C...

 John Follis for Architectural Pottery, fake Tackett cansiers and a Kenji Fujita vessel. Pond Farm / Marguerite Wildenhain Ben Seibel for Jenfred Ware. Distributed by Raymor. Ashtray from the Craig Ellwood designed South Bay Bank Stool by Phillip Lewis, as seen in the exhibition, STOOLS from the JF Chen Collection , by  Marta  &  JF Chen . More on the exhibition, here .  A book was published by Marta and JF Chen.  I've had a number of these stools over the years but never knew who designed them. I was told by a dealer who I purchased one from that he once had one with a Made in Japan sticker under the seat. That turns out to be not true. It turns out that they were made by a San Francisco Bay Area woodworker named Phillip Lewis. The information came from the family who purchased one from a friend in San Francisco. Fortunately that information came about about as Marta was cataloging the exhibition and I was able to pass along the information. The f...

 Luther Conover and Plant Stands. This was actually from the weekend before last. Perfect fit They sure do look like the ones in the Architectural Pottery catalog. Tony Paul wall-mounted bar for Woodlin Hall, Richard Schultz table (that is an original color too) and two John Follis bowl for Architectural Pottery. This is from last weekend. Perfect for the Tony Hall from a few weeks ago.  Perfect timing. The 1952 Raymor ad for the bar.

  Architectural Pottery by David Cressey and John Follis, Japanese bronze and books