February 2000 Issue
Folk Art Center Shows Three Exhibits
The Folk Art Center in Asheville, NC ,will be showing three exhibitions. The Main Gallery offers a chance to see An Evolution of 20th Century American Ceramics, an exhibit of work that represents the evolutionary changes in the progress of American studio ceramics in the last century through Mar. 26. Through Feb. 29, in the Folk Art Center's Focus Gallery, will be, Works on Paper, from the Guild's Permanent Collection will represent three past Guild members who worked in hand printmaking. On view in the Center's Interpretive Area will an Appalachian White Oak Basketmaking display through Mar. 12. This exhibition displays detailed illustrations of the entire process from choosing a tree, to separating the growth rings, to weaving a basket.
The Permanent Collection of the Southern Highland Craft Guild is fortunate to own examples of ceramic work created during the last century from various regions in the US. Some of these examples, which show the evolution of 20th century American ceramics, will be on view in the Main Gallery.
At the start of the 20th century, a revolution in studio ceramics was beginning to take place, overthrowing basic assumptions held by ceramicists at that time. By the close of the century, these ideas were showing themselves in the work of potters everywhere in different ways. In gradual stages, varying from potter to potter and region to region, freedom from the restraints of traditional forms and uses of ceramics were sought, ushering in a means to communicate larger ideas, concepts and aesthetics through clay.
The inception of this revolution was in 1876, on the nation's 100th anniversary. At a Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia there was a display of Japanese ceramics. The simple lines and forms of this pottery had an aesthetic unlike any in America or Europe. This small exhibition attracted great attention from potters as well as the general public. The style seemed to embody many of the popular ideals of the Arts and Crafts Movement, then gaining momentum, which upheld the return to simplicity, integrity and handcraftsmanship in the face of widespread industrialization. It has been speculated that this Centennial Exhibition was pivotal in bringing later changes to public taste in ceramics. By the beginning of the 20th century, the desire for the over-decorated, rarefied forms of the Victorian era was replaced by a fascination with simpler, more rugged, and obviously hand-thrown vessels.
The folk potters of the southern Appalachian mountains, pursuing a long tradition of simple forms and techniques, found themselves naturally in-step with this new aesthetic.
During the Southern Mountain Craft Revival Movement of the 1920s, the Appalachian folk potters received attention for their sturdy, utilitarian vessels, influencing fine art ceramicists toward a cleaner, less affected style.
By the 1930s, this movement was replaced by Modernism, led by the Abstract Expressionists. In breaking from practical ideals of the past, artists throughout the nation began to embrace the conceptual, whimsical, and even the absurd. For ceramicists, this brought into question the need for their work to be utilitarian. Many freed themselves from the constraints of functionality, asserting ideas above usefulness or beauty. Others brought elaborate, abstract glazing to the surface of their vessels. Folk potters, out of economic necessity, began taking risks with new technologies. While retaining their functional forms, they began experimenting with commercial glazes and clays, often using brighter colors and illustrative brushwork.
In this exhibition, one can see samples of the progress that has been made over the past century in ceramic art. While some potters have adhered closely to traditional forms, they may have sought expression in surface decoration, evoking the style of their era. Others have broken away, experimenting with the alteration of traditional wheel thrown forms, or working with clay slab construction. Each piece represents an innovative link, an advancement, albeit subtle at times, in the history of American studio ceramics. Guild Gallery assistant Margaret Park notes, "The revolutionary changes came as the result of the individual efforts of many, as opposed to the genius of a few." The exhibition runs through Mar. 26.
In the smallest of the Center's three gallery spaces the Focus Gallery will show several pieces by three past Guild members who worked in hand printmaking.Works by the late Fannie Mennen of Rising Fawn, GA, Don Harris of Roanoke, VA and L. Lyle Neal of Abingdon, VA, illustrate the range of design and subject matter in southern Appalachian printmaking.
Fannie Mennen, who grew up in Chattanooga, TN, did not consider herself an artist until after she had taught art in schools for many years. Stricken with polio in her first year of life, Fanny's childhood years in the early 20th century were marked by many doctor visits, surgeries and long convalesces. Despite her physical handicaps, Fannie studied music and art at Peabody College in Nashville, TN. For many years she assumed that she herself was not an artist, but nonetheless recognized how she naturally inspired others to do artwork. For thirty years she taught art in Chattanooga, and on weekends she would retreat to her studio/home atop a spur of Lookout Mountain in Rising Fawn, GA. In the quiet of her two-acre retreat which she called "Plum Nelly" ('Plumb' out of Tennessee and 'Ne'ly' out of Georgia), Fannie would paint watercolor pictures of the wildlife around her.
One Christmas, she and a group of artist friends decided to make linoleum block-print holiday cards. Fascinated by the possibilities in printmaking, Fannie knew she had found her medium. For the rest of her working life she was a prolific printmaker, depicting scenes and sayings of the rural mountains. Working from a wheelchair most of the time, Fannie was known for her tireless commitment to her work and the arts community.
In 1947, she invited local artists to hold an outdoor art show at her home. Called the Plum Nelly Clothesline Art Show, it attracted 300 visitors the first year, raising money for a local bookmobile. In the following years it became enormously successful, attracting as many as 16,000 people up the winding roads to the perilous bluff for the two-day, outdoor event. The arts and crafts represented were some of the finest in the region, and the Clothesline Art Show did much to develop the art community around Chattanooga.
Printmaker and fine artist Don Harris graduated from the Museum School of Fine Arts in Boston, MA, and later became an art professor at the University of Virginia in Roanoke. A painter and jeweler as well as a printmaker, Harris exhibited his work throughout Virginia and the Carolinas from the 1950s to the 1970s. His work is found in many public and private collections including the Mint Museum of Art in Charlotte, NC, and the Roanoke Fine Arts Center in Roanoke, VA.
L. (Lucy) Lyle Neal was a Guild member during the 1980s. She juried into the Guild for printmaking, and some of her work was donated to the permanent collection. The exhibition will continue through Feb. 29.
The Appalachian White Oak Basketmaking display in the Folk Art Center's Interpretive Area through Mar. 12 makes clear to visitors that this traditional Appalachian craft of cleaving the hard wood of a tall oak tree into strips fine enough to weave a basket is an almost impossible task to attempt by hand, but can scarcely be attempted any other way. This exhibition displays detailed illustrations of the entire process from choosing a tree, to separating the growth rings, to weaving a basket.
Long before there were tin cans, plastic, or even paper bags in these mountains, people would weave baskets for countless everyday uses. Baskets were specialized in agrarian culture for such things as eggs, bread, tools, or for measuring a crop's yield. Farming families would weave baskets in spare hours for trade or sale, helping the family's economy. Skills for making various oak baskets have been passed down through Appalachian families, and some who have inherited these skills are highlighted in the exhibition. Guild members Aaron Yakim and Cynthia Taylor of Parkersburg, WV have coordinated this educational display with help from the WV Commission on the Arts and the Ohio Arts Council, Masters of split-oak basketmaking themselves, Yakim and Taylor illustrate through pictorial essay how they cut and carry a tree from a hardwood forest, split it with wedges and knives, and make even finer splits on a shaving horse.
Also included in the Interpretive Area are examples of historic white oak baskets from the Guild's Permanent Collection made by regional craftspeople of the last century. The intriguing variety of patterns, sizes and shapes found in these sturdy containers indicates their varied uses in rural life. Designed for durability and bearing an arresting beauty, baskets are one of the few handcrafts which can not be duplicated by machine. If woven properly, with well-prepared splits, a white oak basket offers generations of use.
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