The North Gallery was built in 1952 as a garage for vehicles of the Western Clay Manufacturing Company. With the creation of the
Archie Bray Foundation, the garage was transformed into an art gallery, displaying and marketing the works of artisans and students of the foundation, as well as outside artists from the world over.
Ostensibly built in 1952, The Pottery was purpose built as an artist's studio, housing a display and sales room and studios with potters wheels and other equipment for throwing pots and other ceramic arts.
As do many locations within the the Archie Bray Foundation, The Pottery displays on its exterior ceramic artworks in the form of ceramic panels, most, if not all, created by artisans on site. Throughout the site one will encounter a plethora of ceramic artworks, some incorporated into structures, many seemingly scattered about among the buildings and other structures.
A
Virtual Tour of the entire Archie Bray Foundation site, which includes the studios and galleries, is well worth one's time.
Begun as a brick factory in Butte, MT by C.C. Thurston in the 1870s, the Butte business was moved to the Helena area in 1883, and bought in 1885 by Nicholas Kessler, a native of Luxemburg, who emigrated to the United States in 1854. Kessler had begun producing brick in another Helena brickyard in 1866. Another major Helena brick maker, Jacob Switzer, operated a brick making facility near his clay pits at Blossburg. In 1905 the Switzer and the Kessler works merged, incorporating the
Western Clay Manufacturing Company. By 1915, Western Clay had become Montana's largest clay product manufacturer.
Today the complex is home to the
Archie Bray Foundation, a ceramics school which grew out of the clay products manufacturing business and which enjoys a national reputation in pottery and the ceramic arts. Though presently closed due to COVID-19, it will soon reopen to students and the public.
Archie Bray Foundation Galleries
The Archie Bray Foundation provides free access to some of the finest ceramic art found anywhere in the nation. The
North Gallery, open year-round, houses a rotating exhibition space and the Sales Gallery, where you can buy work by current and past resident artists. During the summer the Bray's 3,500-square foot Warehouse Gallery, a converted brickyard building, features an exhibition of work by current resident artists and our Annual Resident Benefit Auction.
Solo exhibitions by departing resident artists take place at different times during the year, and additional Bray exhibitions are held at galleries throughout the country.
The Bray grounds contain hundreds of ceramic artifacts and site-specific sculptures created by former resident artists. Visitors are invited to explore the grounds, and self-guided walking tours can be taken anytime during daylight hours. Special group tours can be arranged through the Bray office.
The permanent ceramics collection contains more than 1,000 pieces and continues to grow. It includes work of past residents as well as several historical pieces, including work by world-renowned artists Bernard Leach, Shoji Hamada, Peter Voulkos, Rudy Autio, Ken Ferguson and David Shaner. A rotating selection can be viewed in the Pottery Gallery.
From the Archie Bray Foundation