Biloxi Babies

It all started with a photograph of my beautiful mother on her honeymoon. She sat on a seawall in Biloxi, Mississippi, dressed in an off the shoulder blouse and flouncy skirt, gazing coquettishly at my adoring father as he snapped the photograph. The seawall was patterned brick, the Gulf frothing with whitecaps... as a child, it was one of my favorite photographs.

So as we breezed along I-10 West on a beautiful spring morning this week, I saw an exit for Biloxi and said, "Hey - let's spend the night here!" I had a fantasy about finding that sea wall and having my picture taken, for old time's sake.

Of course I should have realized that Hurricane Katrina had done away with pretty much everything on the beach in Biloxi. Except for the casinos, of course, which lurk along the beachfront like gaudy predators ready to pounce on the unsuspecting geriatrics who enter their doors with a few bucks in their plaid pants pockets.

Undaunted, we reserved a bargain casino hotel room and ventured out onto the beach. As Dick prepared to take a photo of me on the new and unlovely sea wall, we noticed in the background an architectural wonder under construction that could have been created by no one other than Frank Gehry. We investigated and discovered that it was, in fact, a Gehry building which will house the Ohr-O'Keefe Art Museum. The museum was intended to open in 2006, but of course, Katrina destroyed the early construction - now the Museum should open in Fall 2010.

Why is it called Ohr-O'Keefe? The O'Keefe part is easy - he was a former mayor of Biloxi and local philanthropist who donated most of the money for the museum. The Ohr part is a wonderful story - about George E. Ohr, the "Mad Potter of Biloxi", whose collection of eccentric pottery will be housed in the museum. According to Smithsonian Magazine, Ohr was born in Biloxi in 1857, went to school in New Orleans, then apprenticed as a file cutter, a tinker, an assistant in his father’s blacksmith shop, and even put out to sea before chancing upon his life's work at 22, when he became a potter in New Orleans.

The rest, apparently, is history. He came back to Biloxi, built a pottery shop next door to his parent's house, and used clay from the Tchoutacabouffa River to make some of the wildest pottery the locals had ever seen. His humorous signs promoting his “Pot-Ohr-E” gave Ohr a reputation as an eccentric whose shop was worth a visit mainly for a laugh. As you can see in the photograph, he was a 19th century version of Salvador Dali - taking wacky photos of himself, letting his beard grow long, racing a motorcycle on the beach and walking the streets of Biloxi in a flowing robe, dressed as Father Time.

He often spoke and wrote in a disjointed stream of consciousness: “We are living in an Age of Wheels—more wheels, and wheels within Wheels—And MACHINE ART Works—is A fake and Fraud of the deepest die.” Right, George - I think.

At any rate, his work was discovered and became famous when Jasper Johns used images of Ohr pots in some of his paintings, and now, of course, Ohr's works of art sell for up to $60,000 each - although he sold very few while he was alive. 7,000 pots were rescued from his son's auto repair shop in Biloxi in order to build the Museum's collection. I have set up this true story as an inspiration to my husband - and other eccentrics we know - it's not too late to be a successful artist!

To our friends who are wondering what the heck we were doing in Biloxi in the first place: we've picked up Dick's car in Florida and are on our way back to pick up my car in Marin County... more to come soon. Cheers - we'll drink a toast tonight to George E. Ohr - my new hero.