George Ohr (1857-1918) American, Rare Antique Joseph Jefferson Black Ceramic Mug. The actor Joseph "Joe" Jefferson III, best known for portraying Rip Van Winkle on the stage and in several silent films, visited Ohr's studio on March 18th, 1896. He wrote an inscription on one of Ohr’s pots, and Ohr created what are now referred to as “Jefferson Mugs” in his honor, with that same inscription on this piece: "Here's your good health and your family's and may they all live long and prosper, J. Jefferson." One of these mugs is part of the Smithsonian Institution collection. Jaunty handle, thin walls, and a plastic label attached which reads "George Ohr Mug J J Jefferson Black $4,400.00" as well as a smaller paper label with the same price listed. Incised numbers on the bottom, as well as the inscriptions "G. E. Ohr, Biloxi" and "Previous to No. 16, Not Numbered."
Condition: Good.
Size: 4 1/2 x 3 1/4 x 3 in.
George Edgar Ohr was born on July 12th, 1857 in Biloxi, Mississippi, where he spent most of his life. His parents were German immigrants who had arrived in New Orleans, Louisiana around 1850, with his father establishing the first blacksmith shop in Biloxi a few years after. Ohr tried many jobs before discovering an interest in ceramics in 1879 while apprenticing to Joseph Fortune Meyer, a potter whose family hailed from the Alsace-Lorraine region. He traveled around the country for two years visiting various potteries before returning to Biloxi to open his own studio in 1883. The following year he exhibited and sold his pottery at the World’s Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition in New Orleans, where he met Josephine Gehring. He married her two years later, and they had ten children together, of which only six survived to adulthood. In 1894 a fire burned much of Biloxi to the ground, including Ohr’s workshop. With most of his previous work destroyed, Ohr began anew, and many historians consider this a turning point in his life and career. His following work showed tremendous energy and fluidity, with his innovative experimentation in modern clay forms seen as a precursor to the American Abstract-Expressionism movement. Ohr claimed to have made over 20,000 ceramic pieces in his lifetime, and called his pots “mud babies.” He kept and displayed all the burnt and mangled pieces that survived the fire, which he referred to ever after as his “burned babies.” For much of his life Ohr was widely known for his eccentric self-promotion, operating his studio as a regional attraction called the “Pot-Ohr-E,” and his main customers were curious tourists drawn in by his odd-looking workshop and numerous signs. He achieved state-wide notoriety as the self-proclaimed “Mad Potter of Biloxi,” styling himself with a chaotically swept hairstyle and goatee, but when he traveled in 1904 to the St. Louis World’s Fair with hundreds of pieces to sell he was met with mixed criticism and not a single sale. Frustrated, he never left Biloxi again, and died of throat cancer on April 7th, 1918. For decades after Ohr’s death his remaining pieces sat in a garage behind his sons’ gas station in Biloxi, until in 1970 an antiques dealer named Jim Carpenter stumbled upon the collection and bought most of them. He promoted the pieces in auctions and sales in the north, leading to a resurgence of attention in Ohr’s work and a reappraisal of his career. The Ohr-O’Keefe Museum Of Art in Biloxi had the largest single permanent collection of his work, but it was partially destroyed during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 when a casino barge was washed ashore and slammed into it. Three new buildings were designed by Frank Gehry and opened to the public in 2010, with a prominent selection of work by Ohr. His work is now seen as incredibly ground-breaking and ahead of its time, with his pieces extremely rare and highly coveted.
Good.
