EarlyAmericanCeramics.com: The Purinton Family Red Earthenware Marriage Jars from Southeastern Massachusetts on Display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City

Monday, September 3, 2018

The Purinton Family Red Earthenware Marriage Jars from Southeastern Massachusetts on Display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City

Earlier this summer, I posted an article that identified the whereabouts of a pair of red earthenware marriage jars from the Purinton family in southeastern Massachusetts. The location of these jars was last publicly known in the 1970s when they were advertised in the Magazine Antiques, and have been owned privately ever since. I also made it a priority to visit these objects during my recent trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

This is what I published on this website on June 22, 2018, "I was first introduced to this remarkable pair of red earthenware marriage jars, made for George and Debby Purinton in Somerset, Massachusetts by Falmouth, Massachusetts antiques dealers, Hilary and Paulette Nolan, as well as Sheffield, Massachusetts antiques dealer, Sam Herrup. On a few occasions, I have written about these objects on this website, but I also recently cited the jars in a feature story I wrote about the eighteenth and nineteenth century pottery industry in southeastern Massachusetts for the June 2018 issue of Maine Antique Digest.

However, I only knew about the existence of these jars based on an advertisement placed by antiques dealers, John Bihler and Henry Coger in the January 1974 edition of the Magazine Antiques. Although, I knew the jars have been in private ownership since the 1970s, but I was not aware they had been recently gifted to a prominent museum in New York City.

I learned earlier this week that they had been acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art thanks to Port Jefferson, New York collector, Anthony Butera who frequently visits the museum. Apparently, the jars have been in Manhattan for a few years now, but they were just recently added to an exhibit for public viewing in Gallery 704, located in the museum's Americana Wing.

According to the MET, "In the 1970s, Robert A. Ellison Jr. began collecting the works of the most celebrated European artist-potters favoring large-scale works with stunning glazes. The Museum recently acquired 76 works from the Ellison Collection that represent some of the best examples of Art Pottery produced in Europe between 1880 and 1930.

Bob Ellison also made a spectacular promised gift of more than 300 American ceramics to the Museum in 2009 (which include these marriage jars that finally made their way to the museum in 2015)."

Aside from the history, these jars demonstrate a miraculous amount of skill, especially the style of slip-decoration, which is hardly found with red earthenware production in New England before or after the American Revolution. But the handles are also fascinating since this form of jar is typically found without handles today.

Here is also a link to a New York Times article from 2009, which further analyzes Robert A. Ellison Jr.'s Collection; whereas, Antiques and the Arts Weekly has also published some stories about Ellison in recent years."

Southeastern Massachusetts Red Earthenware Marriage Jar