Description
The Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art is dedicated to preserving and sharing the unique legacy of Biloxi potter George Edgar Ohr and the diverse cultural heritage of the Mississippi Gulf Coast. A Smithsonian affiliate, the Ohr-O’Keefe is located on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico in Biloxi, Mississippi, on a campus designed by Frank Gehry. The museum offers exhibitions and programming that exemplify the independent and innovative creative spirits of George Ohr, emancipated African American craftsman Pleasant Reed, and Ohr-O’Keefe Museum architect Frank Gehry. The campus includes the Center for Ceramics, a state of the art ceramics studio and classrooms.
George Edgar Ohr (1857-1918) was an American ceramic artist and self-proclaimed “Mad Potter of Biloxi,” whose eccentric vessels were rediscovered in 1968, when an antiques dealer was offered the cache of over 7,000 pots that Ohr’s son had kept for decades in a garage. Created during the years 1895 to 1905, the ceramics achieved fame when mid-century American artists including Jasper Johns and Andy Warhol started to collect them.
The museum’s beginning dates to 1994, when a group of local collectors and enthusiasts opened the George E. Ohr Art and Cultural Center in the Biloxi Library building. In 1998, Biloxi’s former mayor Jeremiah O’Keefe provided a gift of $1 million dollars to fund an independent museum, with the Center’s more than 300 ceramic objects by Ohr as the core collection. The Ohr-O’Keefe would be the first museum in the United States dedicated to a single ceramicist, and Frank Gehry was chosen as its architect. Initially slated to open in 2006, the half-completed campus was devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The museum has worked steadily to fully reestablish the ten-building Gehry complex, 90 percent of which was reopened in 2014. Remaining work centers on the interior outfitting and installation of four small freestanding gallery buildings, intended for the permanent display of the George Ohr collection.
Having fully completed one gallery building and nearing completion of the second, the Ohr-O’Keefe seeks funding to outfit and install a third. As with the first two, completion of the third building will include installation of unique concave walls, wood flooring, custom casework, and site-specific lighting. Once completed, the four galleries will offer the largest permanent exhibition of George Ohr art pottery. Close to 200 Ohr works from the collection are already on view, and 150 are prepared for installation in the third building. Additionally, Ohr collectors of national prominence are poised to make significant gifts and loans to the museum once the galleries are completed.
The project will be overseen by the museum’s executive director, Kevin J. O’Brien, who joined the organization in 2013.