With Heart & Hand: Art Pottery in Queensland 1900–1950’ is the most comprehensive survey of the art pottery produced in an Australian state. It includes over one hundred potters from Brisbane and regional areas, whose practices during the early twentieth century significantly influenced art and craft movements throughout Australia.
The exhibition takes as its nucleus the work of pioneering artist Lewis Jarvis (L.J.) Harvey, his students, and the distinctive style that became a hallmark of what is now known as the Harvey School. Harvey’s teaching method was firmly grounded in the British Arts and Crafts Movement, which advocated the revival of hand-production methods. His pottery classes, initiated in 1916 at the Central Technical College in Brisbane, operated for over thirty years and encouraged students to work local clays by hand, a distinct and purposeful alternative to factory-made household items during a period of burgeoning mass manufacture. Harvey’s method was unique globally, and attracted the attention of Vi Eyre, Nell McCredie, and Annie Mitchell, who became prominent practitioners and who transferred his influence interstate.
This project has uncovered the significant number of women who were practising during the period, many of whom were overlooked by past research or credited as hobbyists or “unknown” creators. Though at the time they were rarely regarded as professional artists, these women were vitally important to the development and appreciation of the pottery medium in the early twentieth century. Harvey encouraged the women in his school beyond amateur status: he collected pieces by his leading students, found opportunities for them to exhibit and sell their works professionally, and encouraged them to exhibit nationally.
Image:Bessie Devereux, ‘Vase (geometric design), Vase, Three-handled vase, Salt glazed bowl, Salt glazed vase, Potpourri jar’, c. 1920s. Earthenware, hand decorated and glazed, dimensions variable. Collection: Griffith University
