Mudman Standing on Barbara Willis

Ask me about Mudmen and my thoughts immediately jump to some sort of creature from the blackest of lagoons. "Mudmen!" I shout, "Mudmen scare me! Keep the Mudmen away from me!"
I don't know anything about mudmen, except what I just read on this webpage about mudmen. In short, mudmen are small ceramic figures incorporated into tabletop bonsai displays...little dioramas depicting Chinese village life.
On eBay right now is this Mudman fellow standing in the shrubbery. I don't know anything about him. I don't know anything about his greenery. But I do know that he is standing in a sweet mid-1940s Barbara Willis low bowl...square, chartreuse with tooled unglazed sides, about 5 and half inches square.
I wonder how hard it would be to de-Mudman this thing? I wonder how much I would regret doing that later?

Potter's Art in California

I picked up a book last week that I recommend to all fans of California Pottery...The Potter's Art in California 1885 to 1955 by Hazel V. Bray. Published in 1980, this is the catalogue for a 1978 exhibit at Oakland Museum and Scripps College. Excellent information on the early potters of California...Alexander W. Robertson, Ernest Batchelder, Arequipa Pottery, Rhead Pottery and others from before the Great Depression. These are all the great artists who preceded the Mid-Century Modern crowd with whom California Pottery is most often associated. Those people are in here too...the great studio potters of 1940 to 1955...Glen Lukens, William Manker, Otto Heino, Edith Heath, Laura Andreson and others. Best part of the book are the super color and black and white photos of representative pieces.
Up top is a picture of some Arequipa Pottery from about 1913...a "Madrona" vase by Albert L. Solon and a beautiful green bowl by Frederick H. Rhead. The bottom pic shows a couple of bowls by Manuel Jalanivich and Ingevardt Olsen as well as a 1937 yellow plate by Glen Lukens.
The Potter's Art in California 1885-1955 is a wonderful addition for your California Pottery bookshelf. It's long out of print, but luckily its readily available from online booksellers...find it on Abebooks

D and M Tile and Hispano-Moresque Tile

Stumbled upon an interesting bit of info on a couple of mostly-forgotten Los Angeles tile makes...D and M Tile Company and Hispano-Moresque Tile. The California Heritage Museum in Santa Monica has had a display on the two companies for the past year and the basic info is still up on the museum website.

Arequipa T-Shirt on Cafepress

I was reading the story of the Arequipa Sanitorium and its production of art pottery on the Oakland Museum of California website.
Very interesting stuff. Sadly, I'll probably never own a piece of Arequipa Pottery. I'll never have an Arequipa vase or bowl. A single piece of Arequipa tile is beyond my reach. So how about an Arequipa T-Shirt? That I can handle! I worked up this design for my RetroRanger Cafepress store last night. It utilizes a couple of Arequipa marks...the crossed initials and the tree with vase mark. It's a RetroRanger exclusive...Woo Hoo!

Twin Winton Mother Goose Cookie Jar

I'm not really up on the cookie jar market, except to know that prices have come down substantially in the last few years. I can't help but thinking that this 1962 Twin Winton Mother Goose cookie jar currently listed on Shopgoodwill.com is worth more that the $5 opening price. It has some nice hand-painted details, which I think sets it apart from Twin Winton's normal production run. Anyway, five bucks for a pretty jar like that is a bargain. Closes 7/9.
UPDATE: Closed at $40.99

California Pottery Fan Mail

What a nice email to receive:

"This is Pat and Cara. We just wanted to send you a note to say THANK YOU for your website on California Pottery!
It has been a great place for information and link-ins to where the "good stuff" is.
Wow! It is truly designed for the collector, but also, for beginner web surfers like us.
As a matter of fact, I'm not sure how I found you, but I do know how to bookmark, so we'll be able to return again!
We are novice collectors. We are very non-profit: we actually do this for FUN! We are just getting a kick out of where we pick up our knick knacks. Because of your website I have decided my "direction" will be California Pottery.
(Pat loves the Hull, Roseville and Weller stuff.)
I am an amateur American History buff and I truly enjoy reading the history of each pottery house.
We are certainly a talented country. How interesting that free enterprise and such incredible U.S. creativity was given away to cheap and imports.
Well, I dont' want to get on a soap box here!
Thank you, Mr. Tubbs! We appreciate your fine website! It has made our collecting more fun!
Sincerely,
Pat and Cara"

Thank you Pat and Cara. I really appreciate the encouraging words.

Barbara Willis Necklace

I'm a big fan of anything made by the hands of Barbara Willis. And I love her story. She made some pottery for a while in the 40s and 50s and then got out of the business, and went about the rest of her life. Fast-forward to the 1990s, Barbara discovers that her old handiwork is on everybody's short-list of cool. Who'd of thought!
At that time Barbara started tinkering around with the pottery again at her Malibu home. The new items she makes are sold mostly local and through The Accessory Hut, at least they have her stuff when they can keep it in stock. But I haven't noticed too many of Barbara's new items popping up on eBay. They just haven't passed into the secondary market yet.
Currently listed though is this knockout Barbara Willis necklace from 2002. Its wonderful and 20 bucks is a steal.

Batchelder Fireplace Mantle

Here's an interesting eBay auction that bears watching. Someone in Redlands has an entire old Batchelder Tile fireplace surround for sale. Interesting in that the thing is unsalvaged and it tips the scale at 400 pounds. Because it hasn't been cleaned up and because its local pickup only the price might stay down. Certainly higher than the $5 opening bid, but I can't see runaway bidding on this.
I hate driving south of Sacramento (OK, honest truth, I avoid driving south of Red Bluff) so I'm not going to bounce down to Redlands in the truck to score these tiles, but I sure would jump on this if I were closer and if the price stays down. My quick figuring tells me that the tiles removed from the concrete could easily fetch $2,000 to $2,500 if parted out on eBay.
And that doesn't include the wonderful 28.5" by 3.75" tile in the center...the design being birds on grapevines. I wouldn't sell that. For two reasons: 1) Its just too cool, and 2) I'd probably break it trying to get it loose from the concrete.

UPDATE: LOL...Auction closed at $4500.