Mark Prieto

American, b. 1949

Jar
1981

Porcelain
10.75 x 10.5 x 10.5 in.
Gift of Nora Eccles Harrison
1984.16

Mark Prieto’s 1981 spherical white bisque lidded Jar was a part of a series of forty-plus jars made for an interior decorator, Agnes Bourne, from the San Francisco Bay Area. She commissioned him to make bisque-fired jars and matching tile to fill a wall in a guest house in Piedmont, California, that was being remodeled. Some jars in the series were salt glazed, and some were altered from the inside in the final stages of throwing.

Mark is the son of Antonio and Eunice Prieto—well-known and respected midcentury Bay Area ceramists who taught at Mills College in Oakland. He is a lifelong clay artist who sat on his mother’s lap at her wheel and watched his father throw for endless hours. In 1968, Mark began his formal training at California College of Arts and Crafts with Viola Frey, making sure his wheel was next to hers. (See Frey’s 1950s Cookie Jar and Bowl; 1966 Planter; and the large Doris figure.) Mark’s parents were best friends and colleagues with Nora Eccles Treadwell and her husband Walt. With her financial assistance, he attended the Rhode Island School of Design in 1970, where he studied ceramics with Wayne Higby (see Higby’s 1970s Untitled bowl), receiving his BFA in ceramics in 1972. He continues to work as a studio potter, making both sculptural and functional pieces.

Billlie Sessions, PhD.

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This object has the following keywords:

• pink
• white

This object was included in the following exhibitions:

• Audrey Shakespear's Ceramic Exhibit: Line As Process or Product , 11/1/2013 - 5/5/2014
• Unearthed , 8/23/2022 - 5/14/2023

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