The Mad Potter Leaves Home and Comes Back Again
BILOXI, LA. -- When the new Frank Gehry-designed museum complex
opens on the Mississippi Coast in 2005, Biloxi's contribution to
the legacy of hometown potter George E. Ohr (1857-1918) will
change dramatically. At the present time, tourists can visit a
single large gallery displaying around 230 examples, owned and
loaned, in a municipal building shared with the local public
library. In the future, a dedicated structure, the George Ohr
Gallery, will draw visitors and donations from around the
country.
Gehry's manipulated architecture would appear to be an ideal
match for Ohr's manipulated pottery. Funding for the new museum
has been propelled by former Biloxi Mayor Jerry O'Keefe who gave
a million dollars in memory of his wife Annette and then worked
assiduously to persuade others to do the same. In the meantime,
supporters such as Bob Tannen and Jeanne Nathan shared their
enthusiasm for Ohr with Gehry, so that he agreed to design what
is, for him, a relatively modest project.
Museum Director Marjorie Gowdy points out, "Ohr predicted that
one day someone would build a temple for his pottery. Our plan is
that many donations of his work will be featured in the years to
come at the new museum. Sometime within the coming year after the
groundbreaking, Mr Gehry will start designing the installation of
exhibits for the Ohr Gallery itself. He'll be interested in
particular pieces of pottery, and we're hoping that potential
donors of pottery will keep that in mind. The buildings
themselves are not really that large, so it will be a very
intimate setting, which will be just wonderful, especially for
Ohr -- it's a very magical architectural design."
The Ohr Gallery will be one part of the complex of small
structures in the Gehry plan, which also includes a Ceramics Arts
Institute, an African-American Art Gallery and a Gallery of
Contemporary Art. When constructed on its choice site on the main
beach-access highway, the complex will provide a cultural
attraction for the entire Gulf Coast tourist scene.
