The Creation of Eve

Name/Title

The Creation of Eve

Entry/Object ID

2003.11.1

Description

Early-20th-c. ceramic tile made of colored and glazed Bucks County red clay. Henry Chapman Mercer (1856-1930) was a major figure in the Arts and Crafts movement in America. Archaeologist, historian, collector and ceramist, he established the Moravian Pottery and Tile Works in Doylestown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania in the closing years of the nineteenth century. The image of the Creation of Eve (Gn. 2:21-22) shows God the Creator calling forth Eve from Adam's side as he sleeps in a fruit-bearing tree from which the Four Rivers of Paradise flow. This is one of Mercer's earliest tiles and was reproduced from a plaster cast of one of the Salerno Ivories, the largest unified series of ivory carvings preserved from the pre-Gothic Middle Ages and preserved in the Museo del Duomo at Salerno (Italy). Mercer obtained the cast of the Creation of Eve in 1900 from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.

Artwork Details

Medium

Clay, Ceramic glaze

Made/Created

Artist Information

Artist

Moravian Tile Works

Attribution

Studio of

Date made

circa 1901

Time Period

20th Century

Dimensions

Height

3-7/8 in

Width

3-7/8 in

Interpretative Labels

Label Type

Credit Line

Label

Gift of Carmen R. Croce, '71