Dreaming in Clay on the Coast of Mississippi

By Maria Estrella Iglesias and Christopher Maurer

Book Overview

Almost a century ago, Annette McConnell Anderson, a New Orleans society woman, vowed that her three sons would become artists. Turning her back on bourgeois life and abetted by her skeptical husband--a grain merchant--she bought twenty-eight acres of woodland on the Mississippi Sound. Beside a sleepy bayou, in the shade of towering pines and magnolias, she opened an art colony, one of the first of its kind in the South.

Backed by his mother's passion for art, her oldest son Peter Anderson founded Shearwater Pottery. Yearning "to make Shearwater synonymous with perfection," he drew the entire family into his adventure. His brothers, "Mac" and Walter, made strange, wonderful pieces, though Walter Anderson eventually left the pottery studio to search for his own artistic path.

Drawn by the exquisite work of Shearwater Pottery, the authors discover that painting, poetry, and storytelling--much of it by strong, unforgettable women--are still an essential part of the family's daily life. Intimate diaries, letters, and poems lead the reader into a stormy, passionate, sometimes heartbreaking past. Meticulously researched and compassionately written, Dreaming in Clay on the Coast of Mississippi gathers one family's eternal legacy of wisdom and beauty, the healing power of art, the consolations of writing and of memory, and the spiritual treasures given us by the natural world.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1604734590
• ISBN13: 9781604734591
• Release Date: April 2010
• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
• Length: 358 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.5" x 6.3" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Wonderful Story of Art in America

This is a great book telling a wonderful story of art in America. This is what American art is all about and how this little pottery enterprise made its mark on the art world. You will enjoy this book very much.

CHICAGO TRIBUNE, 10/22/00

THE STORY OF A FAMILY'S DEDICATION TO EACH OTHER AND THEIR ART By Lynna Williams. Maria Estrella Iglesias, a collector of American art pottery, was in an antiques mall near Nashville when she saw a pottery vase glazed "an extraordinary blue." Seeing it across the cluttered room "was like catching a glimpse of the ocean," and when she turned it over she found a name and mark unfamiliar to her. Iglesias couldn't know it then, but that chance introduction to Shearwater Pottery would open up an extraordinary world apart: the personal and public history of the Andersons of Ocean Springs, Miss. Some readers may already be familiar with the brilliant work of painter, printmaker and muralist Walter Inglis Anderson without knowing the story of his role in the pottery, and the broader story of his family's passionate commitment to art as a way of life. Four generations of Andersons have created Shearwater's art and, while cordially disliking the term "artist," have nurtured potters, painters, sculptors, poets and writers, from the Depression to the present. The story Iglesias and her husband, Vanderbilt professor Christopher Maurer, tell in "Dreaming in Clay on the Coast of Mississippi" has passion and torment sufficient for grand opera, all borne of a relentless dedication to the making of art. It would be a remarkable story in any time. In the America of the 21st Century, when art is so often viewed as extraneous in our daily lives, or as just another commodity to be consumed, it takes on a special, almost electric, resonance. Maurer and Iglesias' book, which starts with an account of their own "falling into" the Shearwater world, is a compelling account of lives in which art, for better and worse, is as basic a necessity of life as air and water. It began with a marriage, 100 years ago. After a 12-year courtship, George Walter Anderson, a prosperous grain dealer, wed Annette McConnell, a lawyer's daughter educated at Newcomb College in New Orleans, a central force in the post-Civil War resurgence of arts and crafts in the South. By 1907 there were three sons: Peter, Walter Inglis and James McConnell. From the beginning, their artistic mother wanted art to wash over them, to be fundamental to who they were. Their businessman father dreamed of "Anderson, Incorporated

Dreaming in Clay --- A Dream of a Book!

It is my privilege to be the first person to review DREAMING IN CLAY. I'm sure many others will find it a great book to read and review. This wonderful book presents the life of a master potter, Peter Anderson, his work, his immediate and extended family, and the evolution of Shearwater Potter in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. It is a book about transformation and affirmation of a family who has strugged and triumphed and the interconnections of the Anderson family, their air, and their love of nature and simplicity.The book is thoughtful and contains information, facts, and anecdotes that inspire one to travel to this small southern town on the Mississippi Gulf Coast to experience the magical feeling of Shearwater Pottery.The authors were clearly diligent in their research and fluid in their writing. The book is filled with fascinating materials that clearly describe the life of this master potter, his talented children, brothers, family, and their reception in the world of art. The authors have written in a manner that makes this unique family come alive to the reader.The book is also unique in the fact that it not only speaks of the great work of Peter and his brothers, Walter and Mac, but also, it is the story of the strong Anderson women who are there to support their art and life dedications.It is a fantastic book. The memoir left me with the sense of "tell me more". It is a must read!