UGLY JUGS

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UGLY JUGS
American Face Vessels     OBJECT NAME Face
VesselsMATERIAL Alkaline-glazed
StonewareMAKER Attributed to Black Slave
PottersLOCATION OF MANUFACTURE Edgefield
District, South CarolinaDATE OF MANUFACTURE
Mid-19th CenturyMARKS NoneDIMENSIONS 5"
High X 3" WideACQUISITION INFORMATION From the
Estate of Mary Elizabeth Sinnott DESCRIPTION
Two small stoneware jugs modeled in the shape of
human faces. The jugs are covered with a mottled,
dark green alkaline glaze. Unglazed kaolin is
used to form eyes and teeth. HISTORY This
distinctive type of ceramic face vessel first
appeared in the American South in the mid-1800s.
Jugs such as these are attributed to a small
number of Black slaves working as potters in the
Edgefield District of South Carolina. None of
these skilled potters have been identified by
name and their inspiration for making face
vessels is unknown. Scholars speculate that the
vessels may have had religious or burial
significance, or that they reflect the complex
responses of people attempting to live and
maintain their personal identities under harsh
conditions.
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Face Vessels, Stoneware, United States, 19th and
20th century, Makers unknown. From the Eleanor
and Mabel Van Alstyne Collection of American
Folk Art
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Some of the most interesting and sought after
vessels are those by Dave Pottery a literate
slave trained to set type for Dr. Abner Landrum's
Pottersville newspaper.
Dave commonly signed and dated his ware, and less
often wrote simple verses on his sometimes
massive twenty and thirty gallon jars and jugs.
Some speak of food, religion, shoes, lions,
volcanoes, and money.
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• Also of African origin are pots termed "face
  vessels"
• usually jugs but sometimes cups, crocks or
  pitchers
• with a face molded into the object using
• white kaolin clay for eyes and teeth.
• These small objects are powerful expressions
  reminiscent
• of African sculpture.

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Depicting a face or human figure on jugs and jars
is neither new nor rare. For centuries,
anthropomorphic pottery has been made in England,
Germany, Peru, Japan, Africa, Egypt and Mexico.
Their uses have ranged from ritualistic and
funerary to honoring nobility. In the United
States, face jugs and vessels were made in the
North beginning around 1810. However, the
southern United States has been the world's most
prolific region for face vessels.
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The purpose of the earliest Southern jugs, aside
from their utilitarian use of holding liquid,
remains a mystery. Whether the pieces were
intended as representations of actual people or
not does not diminish the artistry and
beautifully sculpted and often abstract features
that bind Southern face jugs as a folk art or
their popularity among collectors.
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Between 1810 and 1865, an abundance of functional
pottery was produced in the remote Edgefield
Potteries in South Carolina and sold to
neighboring counties and states. Edgefield
Potteries was worked in part by artisan slaves
who turned the pots, pushed the wheels, carried
the pottery and loaded the kilns. In their free
time, some of the artisans made pottery of their
own choice.
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Many of them chose to make jugs and pots now
known as Face Vessels. These were often stoneware
jugs modeled in the shape of human faces. They
were most often alkaline glazed stoneware in
simple, earthy tones. Though there are many
gaps in historical data regarding the making, use
and meaning of the face vessel pottery, there is
no doubt that the vessels were original,
functional artistic expressions of the African
slave culture of the time.
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This all adds to the mystery of possible deeper
meaning of the Face Vessels in the slave culture.
Few of the skilled potters who made Face Vessels
have been identified by name and their
inspiration for making face vessels is really
unknown. Researchers speculate that the vessels
may have had religious or burial significance, or
that they reflect the complex responses of people
attempting to live and maintain their personal
identities under cruel and often difficult
conditions.
10
Face Vessels have been found along the routes of
the Underground Railroad and on gravesites, both
indicating how highly they were valued and how
closely connected they were with the enslaved
African Americans own culture.
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Sources

• http//www.chipstone.net/SpecialProjects/Toussaint
  /20toussaint.html
• http//www.jonespottery.com/face-jugs/
• http//www.princetonol.com/groups/iad/lessons/midd
  le/robin-face.htm
• http//www.smithsonianlegacies.si.edu/objectdescri
  ption.cfm?ID209