Tour of Clay Art Center & Greenwich Historical Society, January 30, 2024
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We met first at the Clay Art Center in Port Chester, NY, where our tour guide was ceramicist Robin Henschel. The center was founded in 1957 by Chinese-born ceramic artist Katherine Po-Yu Choy and Japanese-American potter Henry Okamoto as a communal studio dedicated to the advancement and practice of ceramic art. When Choy died in 1958 at the age of 30, Henry carried on the Clay Art Center. Today, Clay Art Center is the largest and most active ceramic facility in the tristate area.
Artists can have their own workspaces.
They have access to glazes and space to use them.
A major benefit to ceramicists is access to a variety of kilns.
People of all ages can take workshops, sometimes led by visiting professionals.
Many of Katherine Choy's works are displayed at CAC
The annual "Rising Stars" exhibition at the Clay Art Center displays the work of students.
We next went to the Greenwich Historical Society in Cos Cob, NY. There we began with a tour of their exhibit, Radical Pots & Cooperative Hands, which tells the story of ceramicist Katherine Choy and the Clay Art Center.
Maggie Dimock, Curator of Exhibitions and Collections, was our guide in the Choy gallery.
The GHS exhibit showed the range of Katherine Choy's inventiveness. In this Youtube video, CAC teacher Jeanne Carreau demonstrates how to make pots in Choy's style.
After Katherine Choy passed so suddenly, Henry Okamoto kept the Center going with classes, selling and repairing kilns, and organizing exhibitions. When money was scarce, he financed the center from his own pocket. His ceramic work was made in the evenings when the administration and practical work was done. Okamoto's pottery fit with the Japanese mingei tradition, which finds beauty in common utilitarian objects.
After a bento lunch, Kelsie Dalton, Assistant Curator was our guide for a tour of the Bush-Holley house, a National Historic Landmark. Bush-Holley House Museum presents visitors with two distinct time periods: the New Nation (1790–1825) and the Cos Cob Art Colony (1890–1920).
Bedroom of Justin and Sally Bush, as it may have looked in the 1820's.
Studio of artist Elmer McCrae, early 1900's.
Our last stop was in the archives of the Greenwich Historical Society. There we saw photographs of Genjiro Yeto, and some of his work. Genjiro Yeto (1867-1924) was an accomplished Japanese-born painter and illustrator who played a key role in the formation of the art colony that thrived at the Holley boarding house in Cos Cob.
Genjiro Yeto
circa 1910-11
Genjiro Yeto with artists of the Cos Cob colony, ca. 1897.
Painting by Genjiro Eto
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