Coveted for form and design, prime examples of American stoneware from the Nineteenth Century have long been a staple of every important folk art collection. With brilliant and intriguing cobalt designs decorating the front of these utilitarian forms, these objects are recognized today for their artistic merit, transcending the line of art versus object and becoming firmly entrenched in the category of “fine art.”
Touted as prime examples of early American folk art, stoneware was collected in the early Twentieth Century by the du Ponts and included in the collections that would later become the Winterthur Museum & Country Estate; by Abby Aldrich Rockefeller for what would later become a museum within Colonial Williamsburg; and by Electra Havemeyer Webb for what would later be known as the Shelburne Museum.
It was paraded in the early years of folk art collecting by dealers for both its artistic qualities and historical importance by the likes of Edith Halpert and Mary Allis, and collected by trendsetters such as Preston Bassett and Barry Cohen.
Superb collections of stoneware are on display in institutions throughout the country, ranging from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, as well as all of the aforementioned museums, to local historical societies. Nowhere, however, is there a collection as comprehensive as the one on view at the New York State Museum where the single-owner collection of Adam Weitsman is on view.
“It is probably one of the best collections of American stoneware in the country,” states John Scherer, historian emeritus at the museum. “Each and every piece is a prime example of American folk art.”
The Weitsman Stoneware Collection is a long-term exhibition expected to be on view into 2011.
Weitsman began collecting stoneware at the age of 11 after he and his father dug up two stoneware beer bottles on their property. They took the pieces to a local stoneware collector for identification and subsequently were invited to view his collection. Adam and his father, both impressed with the good stuff they had seen, were “hooked.” The first piece they bought together was a crock with intricate cobalt decoration. The price was $150, and Adam raised his share of the price by doing chores.
Weitsman has come along way since that time. Now 41, he has donated his entire collection of New York State pottery to the museum, where 40 pieces are currently on display. With a cache of four times as many objects in the collection, pieces are rotated on a regular basis in an effort to keep the display from becoming static.
“The museum enjoys a wonderful partnership with Adam,” commented Scherer, who started at the museum in 1967 and became the curator of decorative arts. The curator, who has always enjoyed the forms and decorations of the historically important local stoneware vessels, commented that he followed “Adam’s career over the years reading articles about him in The Newtown Bee [Antiques and The Arts Weekly] as he would set record prices at auctions and shows for many of the pieces that still remain in the collection.”
Weitsman originally donated 100 pieces of New York stoneware to the museum in 1996; however, he continues to add to the collection when exceptional pieces become available and the collection now stands right around 170 pieces.
Scherer has since retired as the curator of decorative arts, but remains active, “going in to the office once a week to see this project through.” That is something that may keep the historian emeritus busy for years to come, as Weitsman keeps expanding the collection, most recently adding three important examples. A catalog of the collection, in coffee table book form, is in the final stages of production and is due out this fall.
While stoneware was made from the Carolinas to Canada, New York was the epicenter of the industry, and many regard the examples made there to be among the finest examples produced anywhere in the country. Because of the transportation network provided by New York State’s canal system, its potters excelled in the stoneware trade. First emerging in Manhattan with makers such as Thomas Commeraws, Clarkson Crolius and David Morgan, and in Albany by the likes of Paul Cushman, potteries cropped up throughout the region, including Fort Edward, Utica, Syracuse, Troy and Poughkeepsie.
The canal and turnpike transportation system in use in the Nineteenth Century made it possible to both ship the “white” clay used in stoneware production upriver from New Jersey to the various potteries, and also to ship the finished crockery back downriver to markets along this same corridor.
Stoneware was the basic utilitarian ware of the Nineteenth Century, having replaced the colorful and much less durable redware forms that used a lead glaze. Crockery met the needs of the early Nineteenth Century homeowner and was a necessity everywhere from the barn to the kitchen. “It was the plastic of the Nineteenth Century,” quipped Scherer, primarily used in the preparation and storage of food.
While the vast majority of the pieces produced at the various potteries were plain and mundane in appearance, the desire to make utilitarian stoneware objects more pleasing to the eye †i.e., more saleable †caused many of the potteries to produce an assortment of artful designs. Although most potters were not trained artists, artisans worked at a variety of potteries, sometimes traveling, as witnessed by unusual features in the intricate decorations.
Flowers and birds were by far the most popular designs, but a variety of rare and desirable decorated crocks and jugs depicting lions, dogs, stags, American eagles, people and even a merman are housed in the Weitsman collection.
The donation of the collection came about after a visit to the museum and a meeting between Weitsman and Scherer. “In 1995, Adam had decided to sell his collection and he put feelers out at several museums, including the Met,” said Scherer. “We couldn’t raise the money, but I kept in contact with him and emphasized the importance of keeping the collection together and keeping these historically important New York State examples in New York. I would ask him from time to time if he wouldn’t like to have his collection here&†with his name on it&†and with a curatorial staff to take care of it,” explained Scherer emphatically.
Scherer reported that he and Weitsman went back and forth for about a year and a half until one day the collector asked the question that made the curator’s dreams come true †”Do you want the collection?”
Needless to say, Scherer wasted no time in getting his ducks in a row. “We went right down and packed it up,” he said.
Although the curator was intimately familiar with the collection, once he had handled each of the items, Scherer was “simply blown over by the quality of the collection”; finding himself in unfamiliar territory and lacking adequate superlatives, the curator simply remarked, “Wow!”
“He has a great eye for art, a great eye for folk art, and what seems to interest him the most is the makeup of the decoration,” remarked Scherer.
When asked about a favorite from the collection, Scherer hesitated for a moment and then remarked that he had several. The first one to be noted was a “W. Lundy & Co., Troy”-marked jug with an incised and blue filled “merman” decorating the upper portion of the handled jug. Noting that it attracts a great deal of attention from visitors to the museum, both academics and the general public alike, Scherer jokingly explains the unique decoration is “a really ugly mermaid, or a merman.”
Other pieces have decorations that are quite concise in regard to an explanation, which is a historical factor that the curator enjoys. A case in point is the Fort Edward crock that displays the county courthouse that was located there. The building has been identified through early photographs.
A jug commemorating a Masonic initiation ritual is one that the curator also finds of interest, decorated with a Bible, torches and other implements of the craft. There are also two jugs made as presentation pieces for the stone mason who constructed the potter’s kiln, one of which was made by early Albany potter Paul Cushman.
Two pieces are decorated with churches that portray different regional styles and taste, one by New York City maker William MacQuoid that depicts a fancy German-style church, while another made in Lyons, N.Y., depicts a typical country New England-style church. Three crocks by MacQuoid celebrate a circus coming to town, one decorated with a tiger, another with a camel and the third with a zebra.
There are also pieces from the Temperance movement, one with a Native American, a crock with a decoration of a schoolhouse with the children entering it and one decorated with a cupid.
In 1987, at age 18, Weitsman acquired what many describe as one of the finest pieces of American decorated stoneware known †a pitcher of incredible size, 28 inches high, with an intricate and elaborate blue design featuring an American eagle. The pitcher, made by Thompson Harrington and John Burger of Rochester between 1852 and 1854, is further decorated with molded motifs around the spout and a handle in the form of a dog. It was said to have been displayed in the Rochester pottery’s shop window as an advertisement, and oral tradition indicates that the pitcher was displayed at a World’s Fair. Weitsman purchased the pitcher from a descendant of John Burger, who was using it in her home as an umbrella holder.
The collection is on long-term viewing, “where it can be enjoyed not only by scholars and stoneware collectors, but by the general public at large,” stated Scherer with a well-deserved tone of pride and accomplishment.
The museum is at 222 Madison Avenue. For information, 518-474-5843 or www.nysm.nysed.gov .
