Museum’s teapot exhibit opens online
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EAST LIVERPOOL -- The Museum of Ceramics announces the opening of the online exhibit, Crockery City Teapots.
Funded by an Ohio Humanities CARES grant, the exhibit features over 250 teapots made in the East Liverpool pottery district. Visitors may go to the museum's home page, themuseumofceramics.com or themuseumofceramics.com/ttcpots to see the exhibit.
The layout of the exhibit was created to closely replicate the museum experience. The opening page is a slide show of many of the teapots in the exhibit. A click on any of them, takes the viewer to a Gallery. Galleries are organized by pottery: Taylor, Smith, and Taylor, Hall China, Harker Pottery and Knowles, Taylor, and Knowles (Lotus Ware) have galleries of their own, while other galleries feature multiple potteries. Each teapot photo is accompanied by basic information such as year, maker, and current owner as well as a brief story about the pot, the designer, or the pottery that made it.
Approximately half of the teapots are from the collection of the Museum of Ceramics, others are photos from private collections. Tea trivia and tea recipes are scattered throughout the galleries. For the museum goer who likes to dig deeper, there are Docent Chats that provide more in-depth information on how a teapot is made, why trademarks are important, and how to tell a teapot from a coffee pot or a chocolate pot. There are six of these pictorial essays.
The exhibit has been months in the making and has about 500 hours of staff time in the creation of it.
Museum director Susan Weaver notes that the exhibit is not meant to be inclusive but rather a random sampling of the thousands of teapots that were made in the tri-state pottery district.
"We got the idea for the exhibit because it was one way of sharing, with a broader public, some of the treasures we have in our collection. Additionally, the restrictions of Covid 19 have emphasized how important it is to offer virtual programs for our homebound or out-of-area patrons."
The exhibit exists in the online format only and is not a "virtual" tour of an existing section of the museum.
Mural to be added at Museum of Ceramics property
A 32-foot mural is being created to enhance the Broadway Street side of the Museum of Ceramics property in East Liverpool. Christopher Leeper will paint the mural on panels which will then be mounted to the handrails around the parking lot between the Museum and the Masonic Lodge. The mural will be a collage of images related to the pottery industry including images of potteries, the Ohio river, workers, trademarks, and ware. Director Susan Weaver said this project has been on the wish list for a few years and is finally coming to fruition thanks to the generosity of the museum's artist group, The Lady Slippers. The 10 members of the Lady Slippers have pledged the funds, which they raised through their annual arts festival, to pay for the mural. Barrie Smith Archer, spokesperson for the group says they "are very pleased to be able to make such a beautiful, historic, and visible contribution to the Museum of Ceramics." The Lady Slippers have been longtime friends of the museum and contribute to the success of the Museum in numerous ways. Leeper is a nationally recognized artist. He is author of numerous books on painting and has illustrated four children's books for the Smithsonian and the African Wildlife Foundation. His work has been featured in many publications including American Artist, The Artist's Magazine and Ohio Magazine. He served as President of the Ohio Watercolor Society, 2008 - 2012 and has won numerous national awards for his work. His art may be viewed at christopherleeper.com or on Facebook, facebook.com/christopher.leeper.75. An unveiling of the mural and a celebration is scheduled for late spring.