Accolay Pottery: Large Glazed Ceramic Anthropomorphic Vase Depicting A Figure

Typical polychrome glazes (yellow, ochre, blue), painted front decoration

signed “Accolay – FDM – 14” on the base.

Very good overall condition 1960s/70s

Dimensions:

Height:36.5 cm

triangular base: 12 cm

In the village, many don’t remember how they ended up there: “They just showed up, that’s all,” some say, much like arriving in Burgundy when you don’t know where you’re fleeing from. Their names were André Boutaud, Slavik Palley, Louis Dangon, and a man named Raude (or Rodet)
Yet they hadn’t come from very far away.
After swinging to the sound of jazz in the cellars of Saint-Germain-des-Près, these four bohemians—who had refused to participate in the STO (Compulsory Labor Service)—sought to lay low. So they left Paris and found a welcoming haven in the ceramics studio at the vocational high school in Mâcon, then directed by the Cluny-based potter, Alexandre Kostanda.
The man who would soon go on to create delicate works in the vibrant artistic milieu of Vallauris alongside Jean Derval, Roger Capron, and Robert Picault served as a mentor to the four young artists.

Accolay was their shared signature. It was a place where the idea of a community of potters was reinvented.