Status message

Your information has been submitted.

  Printer Friendly Version

Bennett Bean

Biography to Display: 

1941Born Cincinnati, Ohio

EDUCATION

1963BA University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa

1966MFA Claremont Graduate School, Claremont, California

PRIMARY WORK EXPERIENCE

1966-1979Professor, Wagner College, Staten Island, New York

APPRENTICESHIPS AND RESIDENCIES

Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Snowmass, Colorado

Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, Gatlinburg, Tennessee

Penland School of Crafts, Penland, North Carolina

BIOGRAPHY

Bennett Bean is best known for his thrown and altered white earthenware vessels, particularly non-functional bowls and teapots. Initially he used little surface decoration other than the spontaneous markings resulting from his use of the pit-firing technique. Gradually his forms and surface decoration evolved in complexity. In 1982 Bean began using acrylic paints to execute extensive abstract surface designs on the fired vessels, and in 1983 he began to apply at first 24K gold leaf and, later, a silver metallic to the interiors. By the mid-1990s Bean had begun to deconstruct his pieces into the two, three or four interrelated abstract vessel forms. He often painted across these groupings unifying them into one design. Firing patterns are incorporated into the surface treatment. These are arranged on a shallow, grey, wooden plinth.

After graduating from the University of Iowa, Bean accepted a position teaching ceramics at Wagner College where he remained until 1979 when he left to become an independent studio artist.

His work has been influenced by Japanese, Native American pottery, English pottery in the tradition of Bernard Leach, and American studio potters, particularly the work of George Ohr.

An interview with  Bennett Bean conducted June 16 and 17, 2001  by Mija Reidel, for the Archives of American Art’s Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America is available at:
http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/interviews/oral-history-interview-bennett-bean-15953.

Public Collections

Public Collections to Display: 

Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona

Arkansas Art Center, Decorative Arts Museum, Little Rock, Arkansas

Brunnier Art Museum, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa

Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, Ohio

Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California

Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, Michigan

Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, San Francisco, California

Grinnell College, Grinnell, Iowa

Hunter Museum of American Art, Chattanooga, Tennessee

JB Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Kentucky

Longhouse Foundation Collection, East Hampton, New York

Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles, California

Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Mint Museum, Charlotte, North Carolina

Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, Alabama

Museum of Arts and Design, New York, New York

Museum of Arts & Sciences, Macon, Georgia

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts

Newark Museum, Newark, New Jersey

New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, New Jersey

Noyes Museum of Art, Oceanville, New Jersey

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Racine Art Museum, Racine, Wisconsin

Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Canada

St. Louis Museum of Art, St. Louis, Missouri

The Studio Potter, 10th Anniversary Collection, New Hampshire

Smithsonian American Art Museum, Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C.

The Toledo Museum of Art, George and Dorothy Saxe Collection, Toledo, Ohio

University of Rochester Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, New York

University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City, Iowa

White House Collection of American Crafts, Clinton Presidential Library, Little Rock, Arkansas

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York

Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut

Bibliography

Bibliography to Display: 

Bean, Bennett. "At Eye Level." The Studio Potter 14, no. 1 (December 1985).

"Bennett Bean." Clay Times: The Journal of Ceramic Trends and Techniques, September/October 1996.

Busch, Akiko. "Bennett  Bean." American Craft 48, no. 2 (April/May 1988).

Chambers, Karen S. "Not Just Another Pretty Pot." Ceramics: Art and Perception 29 (September 1997).

_______________. "Bennett Bean." Ceramics Monthly, March 1998.

Dietz, Ulysses G. Great Pots Contemporary Ceramics from Function to Fantasy. Madison, WI: Guild Publishing, The Newark Museum, 2003.

Gibson, John. Contemporary Pottery Decoration. Radnor, PA: Chilton Book Co., 1987.

Hickey, Gloria. "Bennett Bean." Ontario Craft 13, no. 9 (September 1988).

Lauria, Jo and Steve Fenton. Craft in America Celebrating Two Centuries of Artists and Objects. New York, NY: Clarkson Potter/Publishers, 2007.

Lauria, Jo. Color and Fire Defining Moments in Studio Ceramics 1950-2000. Los Angeles, CA: LACMA, Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., 2000.

Leaning into the Wind: Ceramic Works by Bennett Bean. Little Rock, AK: Arkansas Art Center Decorative Arts Museum, 1996.

Levin, Elaine. The History of American Ceramics from Pipkins and Bean Pots to Contemporary Forms / 1607-Present. New York, NY: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1988.

Monroe, Michael. The White House Collection of American Crafts. New York, NY: Abrams, 1995. 

Pepich, Bruce W. "Bennett Bean." Art Gallery International, March/April 1989.

Peterson, Susan. The Craft and Art of Clay. Woodstock, NY: The Overlook Press, 2000.

Simpson, Tommy and Bill Seitz. Hand and Home: The Home of American Craftsmen. Boston, MA: Little, Brown & Co., 1994.

Smith, Paul J. and Edward Lucie-Smith. Craft Today Poetry of the Physical. New York, NY: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, American Craft Museum, 1986.

Yood, James. "Bennett Bean, R. Duane Reed Gallery." American Craft, December 1999/January 2000.

 

CV or Resume: Click Here to Download
Source: www.bennettbeanstudio.com

CV or Resume: Click Here to Download
Source: Cross Creek Gallery, Elaine Levin Archive, University of Southern California

CV or Resume: Click Here to Download
Source: Elaine Levin Archive, University of Southern California

CV or Resume: Click Here to Download
Source: Elaine Levin Archive, University of Southern California

Website(s):

bennettbean.com

 

Typical Marks
1961-1963
1963-1970
1963-1970
1970—
1970-1974
ca 1989
ca 1998
ca 2010
ca 2014
Cut Bowl
Date: ca 1989
Materials: Earthenware
Method: Thrown
Surface Technique: Acrylic Paint, Metal Leaf
Photo: Loren Maron
Photo: Loren Maron
Photo: Loren Maron
Diptych (BB 117)
Date: ca 1998
Form: Sculpture
Materials: Earthenware
Method: Thrown and Altered, Slab-Built
Surface Technique: Acrylic Paint, Metal Leaf
Photo: Loren Maron
Photo: Loren Maron
Photo: Loren Maron
Triple on Base
Date: ca 2010
Form: Sculpture
Materials: Earthenware
Method: Thrown, Slab-Built, Hand-Built
Surface Technique: Acrylic Paint, Metal Leaf
Photo: Artist
Photo: Artist
Diptych with Grey Metallic Interior
Date: ca 2014
Form: Sculpture
Materials: Earthenware
Method: Thrown and Altered
Surface Technique: Acrylic Paint, Metal Leaf
Photo: Loren Maron
Photo: Loren Maron
Photo: Loren Maron
Photo: Loren Maron
Vessel
Method: Thrown
Surface Technique: Acrylic Paint, Slip
Courtesy Elaine Levin Archives University of Southern California
Courtesy Elaine Levin Archives University of Southern California
Vessel
Materials: White Earthenware
Dimensions: 3.5" x 5" x 5"
Surface Technique: Gold Leaf
Brunnier Art Museum, gift of Carmon Slater and Donald Randall, 05.2021
Photo: Brunnier Museum
Brunnier Art Museum, gift of Carmon Slater and Donald Randall, 05.2021
Photo: Brunnier Museum
Vessel
Materials: Earthenware
Method: Hand-Built
Dimensions: 7.5" x 7"
Surface Technique: Gold Leaf
Brunnier Art Museum, gift of Carmon Slater and Donald Randall, 2016.317.10
Photo: Brunnier
Brunnier Art Museum, gift of Carmon Slater and Donald Randall, 2016.317.10
Photo: Brunnier
Photo: Brunnier

Citation: "The Marks Project." Last modified February 13, 2024. http://www.themarksproject.org/marks/bean