I dragged my sister to an antiques mall just south of my family’s home in Macon, GA, over the holidays to see what was there. I’m always curious about how or whether antiques are different depending on where they are sold.
I didn’t find much “different” in this place. It was a huge tin building with rows and rows of vendor booths – some small, some large. The booths were not manned; there were two very friendly people at the cash register who greeted us when we came in and I’m sure were ready to accept our cash for any item we found in any of the booths. That’s the way these malls work.
The booths had the usual glassware, figurines, jars, metal signs, dolls, jewelry, coins and hand-made items. I also saw a lot of Coca Cola memorabilia – this is the land of Coke – but most of the stuff appeared to be new.
This was the Friday before Christmas, and the place was practically empty. I kept bumping into a man who said he was looking for an “unusual” Christmas gift. I’m not sure if this was the place to find it. Everything appeared to be the same old same old.
Until I got to a booth with ugly and distorted face jugs the color and look of mud. On other shelves were similar pottery, and on a table in the center of the booth were bins and bins of pottery pendants. It was the stall for Boone Pottery, owned by Daniel and Sherrie Boone of Byron, GA.
According to their website, they have been making pottery for some time, both for use and for display. Their aim is to carry on the tradition of southern folk pottery by using the clay of the Georgia soil. Working with clay, glazes and firing, they create both human and animal forms on their pottery. (The pottery in the photos was made by the Boones.)
Daniel Boone came from Washington County, the state’s first pottery center dating back to the 1820s. Early potters didn’t see themselves as artists but artisans, and their wares were for preparing, preserving and storing food. They made whiskey jugs, jars and churns, among other things. It was a family business for many, and pottery “jugtowns” developed around the making of these household essentials.
Georgia is apparently known for its clay – and not the red stuff I remember seeing all over the place as a child. The most important of it is stoneware clay – which is prevalent in the Middle Georgia area where Macon is located – and the Piedmont area, according to the New Georgia Encyclopedia. When fired, items from this clay turn a light gray or tan.
Finally, I had found the “different.” I was very familiar with face jugs. They’re a very popular and important Southern pottery form that has a long history. One famous name attached to it is Lanier Meaders and the family of Meaders Pottery, a long line of pottery-makers that started in northeast Georgia around 1892-1893. Lanier’s father, Cheever, began making face jugs in the 1940s and he found that tourists loved the ugly jars.
Lanier took over when the father was no longer able to work. His jugs are highly collectible and can run in the thousands of dollars.
Face jugs are not the prettiest pottery to have in your home. Neither Lanier nor his father could figure out why anyone would want them. But tourists – and now collectors – did then and still do.
Where face jugs originated from is a mystery: They have been linked to African rituals brought over by the slaves and to Europeans. They were made by African American artisans in the south, especially Edgefield, SC, according to the Smithsonian Institution.
Slaves in the 19th century are noted for having made face jugs on their own time and for their own use. Remnants have been found along the Underground Railroad and on grave sites.
Along with the face jugs, I found another “different” at the antiques mall. I was walking up an aisle and came across another type of Georgia folk art: wood carvings. First, I saw Native American faces carved out of bark. In this place, that was intriguing. On the shelves, I saw more works, including a group of chickens, a Confederate soldier, pirates on a boat, an alligator head and snakes. On the floor was a large wood carving of a mummy.
The booth belonged to a man named Mark Harper of Mauk, GA, who did wood carvings and folk art paintings. A painting called “Pig Feet,” with a black and white pig with human feet, was hanging on a wall with others.
On the front of his business card was a picture of Harper among his carvings and paintings. According to his biography on the web, he became interested in art at an early age, tried his hand at painting, and that evolved into wood carving and folk art painting.
He carves basswood, cedar and walnut. He also uses cypress knees (didn’t know what it was until I Googled) and cottonwood bark, which the carvings on the wall were made of. His pieces were selling for $25 to nearly $100.
