KERAMIC STUDIO 
»*' 
NEWCOMB POTTERY 
Mary G. Sheerer 
OUR years ago there was started in New Orleans 
a little pottery, which, from the nature of its 
hopes and fears, is rendered interesting not 
alone to the lovers of beautiful things, but to 
those who are watching carefully the growth 
of true art in this country. This pottery was the outgrowth 
of a desiie of the president of Newcomb College of New 
Orleans and of the director of the art school connected with 
the college, to establish a pottery under the support and 
guidance of the college, for the purpose of furnishing a means 
by which the students of the art school could continue their 
work after completing the course of study there. In other 
words, it was hoped that it should become a real means of 
support for the advanced student, but only so far as it could 
be done without sacrifice to its educational side. 
The fact of its being under the support of the college 
would make it possible to aim for only the truest and best, and 
so it would not be forced to consider too closely the tastes of 
the public, but to follow honestly and sincerely its own prin- 
ciples. To this end it was decided that the decorator should 
be given full rein to his fancy — provided he did not overstep 
the boundaries of pottery decoration — and that no special 
style should be followed, but rather that each should follow 
his own style, making the decoration in this way more spon- 
taneous — less conventional — it was hoped. 
Also, for fear the decoration should become mechanical 
by repetition, it was decreed that no two pieces should be 
alike, but that each should be fresh-inspired by the form and 
demands of that special vase or cup. 
The whole thing was to be a southern product, made of 
southern clays, by southern artists, decorated with southern 
subjects ! There were possibilities in it. And so with these 
hopes and fears the Newcomb Pottery was given birth. 
The qualities and limitations of the southern clays were 
to be studied and used, if possible, and in addition southern 
flora and fauna were hoped to become the main spring of the 
decorations. For, parenthetically, is it not the most simple 
and unaffected thing to do to look about one for things beau- 
tiful, and not to consider it necessary to go abroad to find them ? 
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It was started with a mere handful of workers, in a 
picturesque old building in the center of the college grounds. 
One of the kilns poked its head above the roof and so was 
announced to the city that a new work was commenced. 
Other kilns were erected, and a potter who had drifted to New 
Orleans from the Golf Juan Pottery, France, was installed, 
together with an instructor, and all necessary appurtenances. 
From this modest beginning it has grown slowly but very 
surely to a well established pottery, meeting with encourage- 
ment in its sales from the people of its own city and from 
visitors from New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, etc. 
It has also been much gratified by receiving letters of con- 
gratulation from several of the important museums of the 
country. 
Prof. Morse of Boston, who is so high an authority, after 
seeing some of it at the Boston Museum, wrote the following : 
" I must express my admiration for the very beautiful 
essays of your oven. It always seems strange to me that in a 
nation of 70,000,000 of people, there were so few potteries 
worthy of recognition. With the exception of that queer 
genius, formerly of Chelsea, we have had to look to the West 
for any expression of art in pottery, and the noble attitude 
taken by the Rookwood of Cincinnati, the remarkable work 
being done by the Grueby pottery of Boston, and the artistic 
work of the Edgarton, Wis., pottery must have put to shame 
much of the pottery turned out by the eastern ovens. 
Now the south enters the lists, and in your work we have 
forms and glazes which must appeal to the critical eye even 
of the old potters of Japan. 
I congratulate you most heartily on your success and 
wish you all prosperity in your enterprise." 
Very truly yours, 
E-D.w. S. Morse. 
The Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia gave the first 
impetus to the desire for making artistic pottery in the United 
States. It was from the exhibits there of the many art 
