By David Hanson | June/July 2009 | 

Shear Beauty

Jimmy Anderson carries on the family tradition of Shearwater Pottery

Finding the potting studio in the pines and oaks, a few hundred yards from a calm cove of Gulf water just outside of Ocean Springs, Mississippi. Hurricane Katrina destroyed many of the old buildings and damaged the main studio and glazing room, but the grayed wood boards, corrugated steel siding, and large windows still stand, gauzy with almost a century of clay dust. Jimmy Anderson, the master potter at Shearwater Pottery, works at the end of a long table covered in clayware. As we speak, he dips the pieces one by one into a bowl of water, wetting the lip of the mug or serving bowl or pitcher.

If you’re not from the Gulf Coast of Louisiana or Mississippi, you’ve probably never heard of Jimmy Anderson. But he’s part of one of the most artistic families in the South—a family of potters and painters and sculptors whose collectible ceramic work is known as Shearwater Pottery. It all started with Jimmy’s father, Peter, who created the studio here in 1928, after studying under the biggest names in the Arts and Crafts movement. Pretty soon, his two younger brothers, Walter and Mac Anderson, both on the verge of becoming prolific artists in their own right, were decorating pieces alongside him. And by the late thirties, their ceramics were on display in department stores such as Lord & Taylor, in private galleries in New York, and on exhibition in museums. For a bit in 2005, they were even on display at the Smithsonian.

Their work is similar to other pared-down, rustic ceramics from the period, like Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs for Teco Pottery and those of Newcomb Pottery in New Orleans. But it’s distinctive for the colorful glazes Peter created (with names like Wisteria, Shoal Green, and Creek). That, and for the decorative etchings, carvings, and painting techniques used by Walter and Mac, often depicting the flora and fauna of their backyard, from egrets to sea turtles. All of it is an art of place that could never have flourished had the Anderson brothers gravitated toward the great art world of New York or Paris. And Jimmy hasn’t altered their signature simplicity much since he took over the business. “I knew theirs were good and I didn’t see any reason to try to change anything. They were beautiful and useful instead of just some special thing to look at,” he says.

He’s also humble about continuing the tradition. “I don’t consider myself an artist,” he says. “I try to do nice forms with my pots, and I guess every once in a while one of mine is art. I’m not an art critic; I couldn’t tell you what makes it artistic. But if the form’s just right and it fits together well and the glaze comes out just right, maybe that’s a piece of art, but I’m not qualified to say whether it is or not. I think of what I do as a craft.”

But the art world would beg to differ. “Jimmy is carrying on a legacy. There are no machines. His hands are on the clay, and there’s something about creating art in the space that you live in that makes it much more intimate, personal, much more part of a whole. Shearwater’s style and design uniquely classify its pottery as that of the Deep South,” says Sally Main, curator at the Newcomb Art Gallery of Tulane University.