| Henry Cavanagh | |
| Ceramic, Bronze and Cookie Jar Artist |
| I recently had an interesting phone conversation with Henry Cavanagh. I have
three of his pieces in my own collection and wanted to know a little more about the artist behind the jars.
We talked about his art, his life,
how he started, and what he's up to now. Since we are fellow "Brooklynites" there was an immediate connection.
And as Henry says, being from Brooklyn is really a nationality in itself.
It might be a little hard to imagine a Hippo wearing a tuxedo or a turban, but that is exactly what Henry Cavanagh imagined and worked on before he started making cookie jars. He lived in Germany during the oil embargo where the Hippo is called the Horse of the Nile. This inspired Henry to make Hippos -- sculptures of dressed, whimsical Hippos. |
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 How Hippos turned into Cookie Jars. John Baeder (famous for his realistic diner paintings) bought a piece of Laura's artwork and became friends with the Cavanaghs. This inspired Henry to make Baeder a ceramic piece as a gift --a personalized butter dish. It was in the shape of a diner and was named Baeder's Diner (complete with palatte and paintbrush). With no intention of selling it, Henry put out on a shelf before giving to it to Baeder. When people saw it, they wanted it. Henry says "Suddenly I was in the diner business!"  14"w x 9"h x 7"d $400. As they followed the Arts & Crafts shows he became friends with Glen Appleman, who was also doing the circuit. And selling his automobile jars. Meanwhile Henry started to make Diner Cookie Jars -- they got larger and larger! The diners soon were about the size of an Appleman car. Somewhere around this time Appleman eventually quit working in ceramics, moving to France and working with computer programs. Since Appleman was no longer at the Arts & Crafts shows, people started confusing Cavanagh with Appleman, asking "Why did he (Cavanagh) stop doing cars"? Diners turned into Cars? Henry says, "I was correcting them all the time, but they still confused us, without me ever doing a car. Since I was always getting asked about 'my' car jars, I finally did a few prototypes. As a friend and fellow artist of Appleman I certainly did not want to infringe on his designs or have my art work confused with his. I checked the copyright information and made sure I was not copying his works". Henry has done several different molds, the diners, delivery trucks, and now cars with whimsical dogs. Each individual version of his jars is limited. And since each jar is made by hand, he can personalize the jar to fit the buyer. For instance "Dad's Ice Cream Truck" or any name a buyer might want. He even does a Kosher Ice Cream truck complete with a Hebrew decal. When enough people request a particular "brand", e.g. Good Humors, it becomes a standard by itself and a parallel numbering system is created. The Good Humors truck was very popular and Henry eventually created another edition of it changing the colors around.
What's New?
Looking Ahead To find out more about his work or to order a jar, Henry can be contacted through his web site shown below. ~Barbara Crews Resources: Some images supplied by Henry Cavanagh | ||||||||||
