Rookwood, Farny, and the American Indian.(Current and coming)(Vanishing Frontier: Rookwood, Farny, and the American Indian)

Maria Longworth Nichols opened the Rookwood Pottery Company in November 1880 in a converted Cincinnati schoolhouse on the banks of the Ohio River. From the beginning, the pottery emphasized the surface decoration of its wares; Nichols, who had worked decorating pottery for the manufactory of Frederick Dallas before opening Rookwood, encouraged exploration with techniques such as incised designs, lightly hammered and impressed surfaces, and underglaze slip painting, and she hired the firm's first full-time decorator, the Cincinnati artist Henry Farny, in 1881. That year Farny visited the West and became engrossed with American Indian culture, devoting himself thereafter to depicting the American Indian in oils on canvas and works on paper. During his year working at Rookwood, he used a special printing technique to create four plaques with portraits of American Indians. These plaques were the first of more than 160 pieces of Rookwood pottery featuring Indian imagery produced by twenty-three artist-decorators between 1881 and 1904.

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An exhibition entitled Vanishing Frontier: Rookwood, Farny, and the American Indian, on view at the Cincinnati Art Museum until January 20, 2008, examines the purpose, process, history, and artistic quality of Indian imagery on Rookwood wares. The exhibition's curators, Anita J. Ellis and Susan Labry Meyn, conclude that the imagery was chosen for one reason: marketability. In an era marked by a national nostalgia for its disappearing frontier and the people and activities associated with it, Rookwood's Indian wares sold well. When sentiment changed and the imagery ceased to be popular, it was dropped from the pottery's portfolio of decorations.

Fifty-two portraits of Indians on vases, plaques, and mugs from James J. Gardner's rarely seen private collection of Rookwood are featured in the exhibition. One highlight, the vase illustrated ...