Vase

c. 1909

Designed by Annie E. Aldrich (American, 1857–1937)
Made by John Swallow (born England, 1856–1920)
Decorated by Sarah Tutt (American, 1859–1947)
Marblehead Pottery (American, 1904–1936)
Marblehead, Massachusetts

The establishment of Marblehead Pottery is an example of the American Arts and Crafts movement’s preoccupation with therapeutic reform through handicraft. Dr. Herbert Hall created a ceramics studio at his Marblehead, Massachusetts, sanatorium in 1904 to rehabilitate “nervously worn out patients.” Hall hired ceramist Arthur Baggs to assist with production. By 1908, however, the pottery no longer employed patients and instead was staffed with professional potters. Renamed Marblehead Pottery, the firm had began to produce pottery with incised geometric designs in contrasting matte colors. The Japanese-informed teachings of painter Arthur Wesley Dow, who led a summer art colony at Ipswich, 18 miles from Marblehead, inspired the vase’s stylized marsh landscape.

Status: On View, Gallery 178
Department: Arts of the Americas

Artist: Annie E. Aldrich (Designer)
Title: Vase
Place: Marblehead (Object made in)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: c. 1909
Medium: Earthenware and glaze
Inscriptions: Impressed bottom, stamped: "M" "P" [flanking front view of a clippership at sea within a circle; Marblehead Pottery mark]; incised: "A" [Annie E. Aldrich designer's mark] / "T" [Sarah Tutt mark].
Dimensions: 21.6 × 17.5 × 17.5 cm (8 1/2 × 6 7/8 × 6 7/8 in.)
Credit Line: Vance American Art Fund; purchased with funds provided by the Antiquarian Society
Reference Number: 2008.74

Rago Art Early 20th Century Design, (Lambertsville, NJ: May 12, 2022), lot 144. https://www.ragoarts.com/auctions/2022/05/early-20th-century/144
Art Institute of Chicago, Annual Report (2007–2008): 19, 24 (ill.).
Brandon K. Ruud, “Three Vases,” Notable Acquisitions at the Art Institute of Chicago, special issue, Art Instiute of Chicago Museum Studies 35, no. 2 (2009): 16–17 (ill.).
Judith Barter, ed., Apostles of Beauty: Arts and Crafts from Britain to Chicago, exh. cat. (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2009), 83-85, fig. 1, cat. 90 (ill.).

Art Institute of Chicago, Apostles of Beauty: Arts and Crafts from Britain to Chicago, Nov. 7, 2009–Jan. 31, 2010, cat. 90.

Blanche and George Byrne, Winchester, MA, by the late 1920s; given to her cousin, Gladys Romney (born in Jacksonville, FL, 1894), Boston, by the early 1930s; given to her daughter-in-law, Maxine Gross Romney (died 1917), Boston, and then Ellenboro, NC, by 1956; sold to Dr. Paul Rappaport, Saratoga Springs, NY, 2003; with McCelland and Rachen, New York, by 2008; sold to the Art Institute of Chicago, 2008.

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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