Biographical materials, correspondence, awards, photographs, and printed materials relating to the career of the noted ceramicist and teacher who devoted the last quarter century of her life to the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.
Correspondence consists chiefly of letters received from museums, colleagues (including Charles Eames), friends and former students. Other materials include biographical sketches, resumes, exhibition catalogs and announcements, clippings, scrapbook fragments, a file relating to students and colleagues, a register of funeral visitors, numerous personal and family photographs and five photo albums of Grotell and her work.
Biographical / Historical:
Ceramist and educator. Born 1899. Died 1973. After several years as a textile designer in her native Finland, Grotell immigrated to the United States in 1927. For a short time she studied with Charles Fergus Binns and from 1938 to 1966 she headed the ceramics department at the Cranbrook Academy of Art. During this period, the height of her career, she became one of the leaders in the development of ceramics as a medium of artistic expression. In addition, her research on glazes for Eero Saarinen made possible the widespread architectural use of colored glazed bricks.
Related Materials:
Slides of Grotell's work located at the George Arents Research Library for Special Collections, Syracuse University.
Provenance:
Order and arrangement is that of the George Arents Research Library for Special Collections, Syracuse University.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
