Recently, I was able to attend a SLAV PD at the National Gallery of Victoria. I had a great day there, attending interesting sessions and reconnecting with friends and colleagues from other school libraries. It was a fantastic day and such a great venue to hold such a conference. The theme was Seeing Things Differently, and several of the sessions I attended focussed on looking at the stories in artworks.
During the lunch break I was able to wander around the gallery, and it was during that time that I came across an exhibition, celebrating a milestone of the 250 years of Wedgwood’s history. I have loved Wedgwood for a long time. Their almost cameo applications on their pottery is lovely, and the blues, blacks and greens are gorgeous.
As I checked out the exhibition, I came across these story tiles. I’m a bit of a sucker for anything story related so these really caught my eye. As you can see, these ones depict Little Red Riding Hood, but it made me wonder if Wedgwood produced more of them.
Here’s what the Gallery had to say about these tiles:
“Wedgewood began producing tiles in its creamware body in the eighteenth century, some time before 1767. Soon after 1800, however, Wedgewood discontinued the production of creamware tiles until 1870 when a fashion for decorated tiles had been established by Minton, and decorated creamware tiles started to be produced in sets.
Thomas Allen studied at the Stoke-on-Trent School of Design. He began to work for Minton, perhaps as early as 1845 but by 1876 had become frustrated by low wages and the domination of the art department by Leon Arnoux and M.L. Salon. He transferred to Wedgewood where he soon became supervisor of the Fine Art Studio, Chief Designer and Art Director. Allen designed a number of tableware patterns for Wedgewood, but is chiefly known for his figure subjects on vases. Allen designed a number of sets of pictorial tiles for Wedgewood, both printed in a single colour, and printed and enamelled. Possessed of a superb technique, he is widely regarded as the leading Staffordshire figure painter of the nineteenth century.”






