Julia Margaret Cameron, ‘No. 5 of series of Twelve Lifesize Heads’ (Kate Keown), (1866). Photo: Courtesy of Sotheby’s

Now let’s get to the main event…

A couple years ago, David Rago, of Rago Auctions, and David Leiber, of David Zwirner gallery, were having dinner at the Manhattan home of Laura Mattioli, the founder of the Center for Italian Modern Art, which shuttered last year after a decade in SoHo. She was displaying an eye-catching pairing of Giorgio Morandi paintings alongside ceramics by George Ohr, the late-blooming fin de siècle sculptor from the boondocks. Leiber, who was inspired by the combination, later re-created it in Zwirner’s booth at TEFAF New York: Zwirner supplied the Morandis; Rago, who has long been at the forefront of the Ohr market, supplied the ceramics. Priced at $15,000 to $150,000, about half of the 19 Ohr works sold.

Rago is presumably hoping for a better sell-through rate this Thursday, when the auction house will hold a dedicated sale of 20 ceramics by the artist, 16 of which are from the collection of Donald Hecht. Market demand for Ohr, after all, has been somewhat mixed over the years. Known as the “Mad Potter of Biloxi,” he created brilliantly kooky forms—small vessels like teapots, vases, and pitchers with in-body twists, ruffling, and ribbon-like handles. Somewhat prefiguring the abstract expressionists, he glazed with splatter and sponge in combinations like blister pink and cobalt blue, at a time when other art potters were using flora and fauna motifs. Ohr, like many artists, was underappreciated in his time, meagerly supporting his family by making functional pottery, like pipes and flower pots, from mud he dug up in the nearby Tchoutacabouffa River. He had a prolific art pottery practice but chose to sell almost none of it. When he died, in 1918, he left behind several thousand pieces that he’d made in the 15 years between 1894, when a fire destroyed his studio and its contents, and 1909, when he put away his potter’s wheel for good. And yet, the work of modern ceramicists like Takuro Kuwata, Grayson Perry, Peter Voulkos, and Betty Woodman all demonstrate his influence.

Installation view, Giorgio Morandi and George Ohr (2024), David Zwirner, TEFAF New York. Photo: Courtesy of David Zwirner

Until recently, Ohr has been featured in museums primarily in the context of folk art, including a permanent display in the American Wing at the Met. There is also a dedicated Ohr museum in Biloxi designed by Frank Gehry, who reportedly told the curator and dealer David Whitney that Ohr’s vessels reminded him of his own buildings. But the institutional community appears to be reconsidering Ohr’s work. In 2021, MoMA displayed Ohr’s vessels alongside contemporaneous masterpieces by van Gogh and Cézanne, showcasing his growing stature as a pioneer of modern abstraction.

Meanwhile, at auction, Ohr’s prices have remained stagnant. His record of $132,000 was set back in 2006, at Sotheby’s, for a 10-inch, two-handled vase from Whitney’s collection. (Rago, however, told me he has sold pieces privately for $200,000.) Hecht collected only the very best examples of Ohr’s work, but has let Rago price the pieces in this week’s sale at levels to entice bidders. There are four two-handled vases—considered the pinnacle of Ohr’s work—estimated between $45,000 and $60,000, but with the starting bids set at only $35,000 and $40,000. One of them is glazed a raspberry color on one side and emerald on the other, with indigo around the rim. There’s a volcanic vase with a twist in the neck estimated at $25,000, and a rare cadogan teapot with a snake-head spout estimated at $15,000. “Ohr has always been underpriced at auction,” said Rago. “But people are catching on.”

Ohr’s most sought-after works combine a colorful glaze and interesting form, with an aspect of funk or folly—like the half vase and the red, ring-shaped bottle that the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art acquired from Rago in 2023 for $63,000 and $69,300, respectively, from the collection of Robert Ellison Jr. Ohr’s unglazed bisque pieces that show the natural marbleization of the clay, once considered unfinished, are now regarded as among the best of his practice, reflecting the maturation of the market. The highest auction price for a bisque piece is $69,300, achieved in that same Rago sale.

One factor that might be keeping Ohr’s prices depressed is the diminutive scale of the works. Almost all of the top prices at auction have been achieved for examples that are six inches or taller. But, as Rago told me, “Scale doesn’t make them better.” After Ohr gave up pottery, he stored his artworks in the attic of his studio, which his sons later turned into an automotive repair shop. Sixty years later, Jim Carpenter, a New Jersey antiques dealer and barber (he cut hair amidst old cars and bicycles), paid the sons $30,000 for all but a few hundred pieces and drove the cache of work north in a semitruck. Given that some of the pieces are as thin as potato chips, their survival up to that point is a marvel. Carpenter started selling them out of his shop for between $50 and $200 apiece, benefitting from a surge in interest in the arts and crafts movement in the early 1970s. Jordan-Volpe Gallery brought Ohr’s work to SoHo, then the center of the art market, across from Leo Castelli’s gallery. Some of the art intelligentsia, including Whitney, Irving Blum, Andy Warhol, and Jasper Johns, bought them. But at the time, Ohr’s market was mostly arts and crafts collectors, like Rutgers professor Martin Eidelberg, who just donated his trove of European ceramics to the Met.

Works by George Ohr from the collection of Donald Hecht. Photo: Courtesy of Rago Auctions

Today, Ohr’s buyers include modern art collectors and museums like the Met, LACMA, MoMA and the de Young in San Francisco. “That’s why Ohr’s market keeps going,” Rago told me. “New people are entering the market.” In 2023, Rago sold 140 ceramics from Ellison’s collection that were not included in his donation of some 600 works to the Met. A grouping of 20 pieces by Ohr in the sale made $795,060, more than five times the aggregate estimate of $157,500. Two works sold for more than $100,000 but did not beat the 2006 record.

In 2021, the New National Museum of Monaco featured Ohr in the exhibition Artifices instables, Stories of ceramics, highlighting the diversity of practice in the medium. Among the works on view was a rare miniature vase by Ohr that the Fiorucci Foundation bought from Rago for $10,625 in 2020. “His work is now in museums in London, Amsterdam, and France,” said Rago. “Just like how the Brits discovered American blues, I think Ohr has to be discovered by [more] non-Americans.”

Thanks, Julie. More on Tuesday,

M

Need help? Review our FAQ page or contact us for assistance. For brand partnerships, email ads@puck.news.

You received this email because you signed up to receive emails from Puck, or as part of your Puck account associated with {{customer.email}}. To stop receiving this newsletter and/or manage all your email preferences, click here.

Puck is published by Heat Media LLC. 107 Greenwich St, New York, NY 10006