QUESTIONS FROM OUR WEBSITE
Music fills the air, with this issue’s “Q & A.” Here
are the details:
Dear CAS Collectors:
I have all 5 members of
the “All Children’s Orchestra,” plus the “Musical Trio,” and thought my CAS
symphony was complete. But the other day, at a garage sale, I found a figurine
of a seated French Horn player, with a Studio marking
on the bottom. This fellow appears to be a grown-up, not a kid like the other
band members I have, and he’s all one color, with no facial features. He was
only $10, so I bought him. But now I’m wondering: are there even more CAS
musicians on the market that I should be on the lookout for?
Mr. Muzik
Dear Mr. M.:
First off, let me say “yikes,” and then add my
congratulations on your lucky find! For $10, you’ve acquired a member of the
very hard-to-find (and usually quite expensive —in the low hundreds) Adult
Band. The 6 players were produced in 1955, the last year of the Studio’s
operation. Because of that, they received minimal distribution, and rarely show
up today. Here’s what we had to say about them in our book, Ceramic Arts
Studio: The Legacy of Betty Harrington:
The
Adult Band is so rare that it’s believed very few complete sets exist today.
The full complement, from Harrington’s personal collection, includes the “Flute
Lady,” the “Violin Lady,” the “Cellist Man,” the “French Horn Man,” the “Guitar
Man,” and the “Accordion Lady.”
Three
Adult Band finishes have been observed: terra cotta with cold-paint,
a solid sandstone art glaze, and a pale pink gloss. Unlike1948’s realistic
Children’s Band, the Adult Band conveys the impression of reality, rather than
its literal depiction. While this certainly was a specific design choice on
Betty Harrington’s part, it was also a practical means of simplifying
production steps, important in the Studio’s cost-conscious final year. The
Adult Band could be trimmed and decorated much more quickly than the kind of
CAS ware prevalent in earlier years. While such cost-cutting steps didn’t
prevent the Studio’s demise, the resulting designs rank among the Studio’s most
imaginative and sought-after.
Congrats again, on this wonderful
addition to your collection! Here’s hoping you’ll be able to round up some more
Adult Band players (and at the same great prices), so they’ll soon all
be making beautiful music together!
And with that, the drawstrings are pulled tight on this
issue’s edition of the “CAS Mailbag.” For answers to your CAS-related
questions, just send them to Donald-Brian Johnson’s
attention. Hopefully, he may even be able to come up with the correct
solutions!