Keith Murray (ceramic artist)
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Keith Day Pearce Murray (1892 - 1981) was a New Zealand born architect and designer who worked as a ceramics, glass and metalware designer for Wedgwood in the Potteries area of Staffordshire in the 1930s and 1940s. He is considered one of the most influential designers of the Art deco style. [1]
Murray was born in the Auckland suburb of Mt Eden, the son of a Scottish father and a New Zealand-born mother. The family emigrated to England when he was 14. He graduated from the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London in 1921.
However, exhibitions such as the 1925 Exposition in Paris, and the 1931 Exhibition of Swedish Industrial Art in London inspired Murray to seek out opportunities to design vases and tablewares for factory production, and as the depression of the early 1930's reduced the demand for architecture he became a full-time designer. [2]
He designed glass for Stevens and Williams of Brierley Hill, creating approxomately 1000 designs between 1932 and 1939. In 1932 he also began working 2-3 months a year for the Wedgewood pottery. His designs in metal were created for Mappin and Webb.
Most of his work was with vases, bowls and similar cylindrical ware, executed in a clean and restrained style with decoration often limited to deeply incised lines or smooth steps in the shape. The whole piece is usually one colour without applied decoration.
In 1936 Keith Murray was appointed architect in charge of designing the new Wedgwood factory at Barlaston. Following the war he returned to architecture and left the field of industrial design.
Keith Murray's work sold well at the time, and has become increasingly sought after at auction as time has passed.
[edit] Further reading
- Helen Cunningham, Clarice Cliff and Her Contemporaries: Susie Cooper, Keith Murray, Charlotte Rhead, and the Carlton Ware Designers, Schiffer (1999), ISBN 0764307061
