Manufacturer
B P Company
Earthenware Pitcher
Date1872
DimensionsOverall: 31.7 x 13.5 cm
Credit LineGift of Mary Shuff, London, Ontario, 1960
Object number1960.052.001D
Label TextThis is a Brownhills Pottery Company pitcher. The company manufactured earthenware at Brownhills, Tunstall, Stoke-on-Trent, England. At first, George Frederick Bowers had owned the works, who operated it until his death. His son, Frederick continued operating the business until it failed in 1871. At that time, James Eardley bought the company. His son, Alfred J. Eardley, and his sons-in-law, William H. Bratt, Robert H. Parker, and George Hammersley, continued operations, calling the business the Brownhills Pottery Company. It exhibited at the 1878 Paris Exhibition.
The Trellis and Bamboo pattern is described as a product of the Aesthetic Movement. About that movement, the Victoria and Albert Museum writes: "The Aesthetic Movement in Britain (1860 – 1900) aimed to escape the ugliness and materialism of the Industrial Age, by focusing instead on producing art that was beautiful rather than having a deeper meaning – 'Art for Art's sake'. The artists and designers in this 'cult of beauty' crafted some of the most sophisticated and sensuously beautiful artworks of the Western tradition and in the process remade the domestic world of the British middle-classes." Aesthetic Movement artists "drew inspiraiton from from a variety of cultures and periods. They found beauty in Renaissance painting, ancient Greek sculpture and East Asian art and design, especially Japanese prints."
NamePITCHER
