Puerto Rican Pottery

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There are very few or no other articles that link to this one.
Please help introduce links in articles on related topics. After links have been created, remove this message.
This article has been tagged since July 2006.

Puerto Rican Pottery operated from 1948-1966 in Santurce, Puerto Rico. It was a small pottery associated with and managed by ceramist Hal Lasky. It was a successor operation to a Puerto Rican government funded pottery that was privatized and subsequently funded by a private bank. It produced a line of hand crafted terra cotta dinnerware and artware.

Common dinnerware shapes were mugs, cups, tumblers, plates, bowls (covered and uncovered), tureens, casserole dishes, trays, teapots and pitchers. Artware shapes included vases of various size, ashtrays, hooded candle holders, planters, incense pots, candelabra and lamp bases.

The most common design patterns are sgraffito-- shapes, symbols, and stylized figures of fruit and animals. Less common are inscriptions in English and Spanish or contours of human faces. Colors used in the glazes range from red, red and black, blue, blue and green, black, green, yellow, peach, teal, turquoise, and other colors.

Although most pieces were pressed not thrown, each piece was individually designed, painted and woodfired —unique forms of art on their own. Lasky, a master potter and designer developed a one step firing process that enabled him to produce inexpensively and quickly pottery that was both functional and beautiful.

[edit] Hal Lasky

Originally studying agriculture Hal Lasky was so moved by a piece of pottery a friend had shown him that he enrolled and won scholarships in the early and mid 1940’s, in ceramic arts programs associated with Dartmouth College, the Philadelphia Academy of Arts (where he studied under Aurelius Renzetti), the ceramics school at Alfred University (Alfred, New York) and the Cranbrook Academy of Art (Bloomfield Hills, Michigan). He exhibited at the Ceramic Nationals (held every year from 1935 until to about 1990 at Syracuse’s Everson Museum) in both 1947 and 1948. The Nationals attract some of the best ceramic artists and potters in the United States.

Hal Lasky’s Vision

Hal Lasky designed a line of ceramics he thought reflective artistically with Puerto Rican culture and history. He encouraged the artisans he mentored to come up with designs that were reflective of contemporary Puerto Rican society and culture.

In Hal Lasky's words:

“ The first thing I did was to take away all the Pre-Columbian patterns they had been working with and in my halting Spanish told them they were now free to design anything they wanted at anytime. They were obviously shaken; for them "designers" were either god-like people or Americans and they immediately began to copy the cheap seconds that at that time flooded Puerto Rico. I let them get that out of their systems and some three months later they began designing things they thought would please me.

“Little by little I began encouraging them to use "found tools:" a broken hair comb - I picked up from the floor in front of them, used and discarded pencils - showing them the faceted sides and rounded eraser end as options. One of the best tools turned out to be old fashioned hair pins women wore in the forties.

“What emerged was an expression which can properly be described as a considerable leap beyond sgraffito. When using colored engobes (thin coatings of different colored clays over the redware clay body we were using) instead of thinly scratching through to reveal the contrasting red clay beneath they made strong, broad, energetic sculptural carvings if you will. Matte glazes were used almost invariably to more thoroughly reveal the sculptural "carving" technique. Each person signed their own design work and had the satisfaction of seeing their initials permanently fired into their pieces. They were free at any time to stop any work they were doing and create their own designs.

“During this period of time I made it my business to keep away from the work table area where they did the designing. I didn't want even my presence near them to interfere with their own self expression. I would wait until they had left for the day to go into the damp room where the daily work was placed for slow initial drying to see what creatively had emerged. Imagine, if you will, the profound thrill I would experience as with each ongoing week the design "personalities" of each would become more strongly expressed so that it was no longer necessary to look for each signature to determine whose work it was. ”

The pieces he and they created were earthy yet elegant. Yet he was influenced also by currents in the American art pottery and industrial design movements of the mid 20th century. In his works one sees shapes and designs reflective of Glidden Parker and Russel Wright. However, he was an innovator, as well. His designs and shapes impacted on ceramic design of the 1960’s and beyond.