A squirrel bottle face-off: the green bottle on the left chews on a nut, the one on the right watches and waits.
In the 1820s, the potteries began producing press-molded doll heads, lions and toy dogs for the enjoyment of children. Lady dolls made as casters and bottles may also have served as toys.
When the project began, scholars initially were unsure whether Moravian figural bottles were press-molded or slip-cast. Their extensive experimentation and contemporary potter Michelle Erickson's replication of the process using a squirrel example revealed that slip casting was problematic because of the thickness of the slip that would have been used. It was concluded that the bottles were, in fact, press-molded, then coated with white slip, glazed and fired. The figures were glazed in vibrant greens, browns and combinations of green and dark purple to simulate an arresting tortoiseshell.
Turtles, included in an 1800 pottery inventory, were the first press-molded figural pieces made at Salem, cast apparently from live (or not) specimens. The turtle signified long life and the ability to withdraw into itself in the face of danger. One small example on view appears to have been made using a live specimen. Another incorporates Native American design elements.
The "Art in Clay" exhibit will include a rare Moravian dark green press-molded turtle bottle, one of only four known examples, a recent acquisition by Old Salem Museum and Gardens in Salem. Just shy of 9 inches, it is considered, according to Robert Hunter, editor of
Ceramics in America
and co-curator of "Art in Clay," a premier example of the surviving figural bottles made by Moravian potters in Salem. Scholars and researchers are hopeful of discovering other examples of Moravian animal figures.
The Salem owl bottle is 7¼ inches tall and appears to be spectacled. The figure has a tortoiseshell glaze and is only one of four known Moravian owl figural bottles.
Of all the bottles produced at Salem, the squirrel form was the most popular, resonant of the general popularity of gray squirrels and flying squirrels as pets. The squirrel bottle, based on the Eastern gray squirrel, was in production as early as 1803. An 1806 pottery inventory lists 96 squirrel bottles. Two types of squirrel-form bottles survive: one that stands erect clasping a nut in its paws, sometimes with a spout in the tail, and the other leans forward and looks upward as if startled or begging.
Fish-form bottles were first cited in an 1801 inventory of the Salem pottery and they have survived in the greatest quantity. Four different forms, with detailed scales, are on view in green glaze and in tortoiseshell glazes of various colors.
Study of two crayfish examples on view revealed that they, like the turtle, were probably made from nature. Only three Moravian examples are known. They also incorporate design elements used by those Native Americans who believed that crayfish were the creators of land, bringing sediment from the bottom of water bodies to add land mass.
The animalistic bottles were glazed only on the outside, suggesting that they were used for dry storage, in use as spice jars and casters.
The small fish bottle with detailed scales and fins has well-defined eyes.
Two kinds of owl bottles are noted in an 1806 inventory, and only four Moravian owl bottles are known to survive. They stand upright, have oversize eyes and radiating flutes, applied spouts and press-molded bases. One example on view was given tortoiseshell coloring, similar to English creamware owls of the 1760s and 1770s.
Bear-form bottles can be traced to the popular English sport of bear baiting. English bear baiting jugs were produced in quantity. The Moravian example on view was molded with a slain pig, perhaps a reference to a 1755 diary entry noting that a bear had eaten one of the best Bethabara hogs. Inventory records indicate that the Salem pottery produced only one form of bear bottles.
While the preview of "Art in Clay" at the Ceramics Fair includes the press molded figural bottles, molds and shards, the full exhibit, comprising some 120 objects, approximately half of which are from the collection at Old Salem, examines North Carolina ceramics traditions through its slipware, faience and creamware, their forms and processes and archaeological material from Moravian sites.
The Salem squirrel bottle looking upward as if begging survives with its original mold from about 1820–1850.
The "Art in Clay" exhibition is a partnership of several institutions and organizations. It represents more than four years of collaborative research and documentation of the major schools of North Carolina earthenware on the part of a group of scholars in the fields of art, archaeology, history and religion. The project was initiated by the Chipstone Foundation and Old Salem Museums and Gardens in Salem, N.C., and is supported by the Caxambas Foundation of Milwaukee. The exhibit will open September 2 at the Milwaukee Art Museum, move to the Horton Center at the Old Salem Museum and Gardens in March 2011, and finish up in September 2011 at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum at Colonial Williamsburg.
The 2009 and 2010 editions of
Ceramics in America
, edited by Robert Hunter and Luke Beckerdite, are devoted to "Art in Clay" and its findings. The 2009 edition presents new information about the Moravian potters; the 2010 edition will expand on the subject, exploring other Moravian pottery centers in the piedmont. The "Art in Clay" project also encompasses an exhaustive online exhibit of the objects and an online database of the material discovered in the course of the project. It may be viewed at
www.artinclay.org
.
The National Academy Museum is at 1083 Fifth Avenue. For information about the "Art In Clay" exhibition, contact Robert Hunter at
ceramicjournal@aol.com
or 757-880-7821.
