Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Marek Cecula, 2009 May 19-20. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Ceramicists -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews Search this
Designers -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews Search this
An interview of Marek Cecula conducted 2009 May 19-20, by Mija Riedel, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, at Cecula's studio, in New York, New York.
Marek Cecula speaks of his childhood in Kielce, Poland, during World War II; his move to Israel at age 16; studies with ceramists Gdula Ogen and Jean Mayer; the influence of Japanese ceramics on his early studies; life on the kibbutz HaSolelim in the late 1960s and early 1970s; the influence of Kurt and Gerda Spurey and their use of porcelain and slip-casting; his work in both functional and sculptural ceramics; his move to Tel Aviv in early 1970s, then to a commune in Binyamina in 1971; his move to Curitiba, Brazil, and subsequent work with Schmidt porcelain factory; "Art Project 79" exhibition, La Jola, Curitiba, Brazil, 1979; his move to Washington, D.C., with girlfriend (later wife) Lanie in 1976; Klepisko (2008); the cyclical nature in his work; move to New York City in late 1970s; the Soho arts scene in the 1970s and '80s; his work blending design and sculpture; establishing Contemporary Porcelain gallery, 1978; interest in work by Memphis Group, Peter Shire, Jack Earl, Ken Price, and Ron Nagle; head of ceramics department, at Parsons School of Design, New York City (1985-2004); continued design and production work, including for Tiffany & Co. and Barneys New York; establishment of Modus Design firm; continued exploration of industrial processes and use of decals in his work; influence of Howard Kottler; his quest to balance digital and handmade processes, and the continued importance of the tactile; "Scatology" exhibition; series Hygiene, his first purely sculptural series; Porcelain Carpet; representation at Garth Clark Gallery (New York City, Los Angeles, and Kansas City, Missouri); series Violations; series Mutants; series Industrial Interference; "Interface" exhibition (2002), in response to terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001; Look Into My Mind; The Stand For the Heroes, 2001; series Beauty of Imperfection; move to Poland in early 2000s; a teaching/artistic position at Bergen National Academy of Arts, Norway; establishment of Design Centrum Kielce in late 2000s; Menorah, 2007, Kielce (site-specific); Six Stations, 2007, Porsgrunn, Norway (site-specific); future projects for the city of Kielce; work with the Łódź Design Festival, Poland, and design center in Cieszyn, Poland; "kilo of earth" product; Last Supper; Mandala; Islam; limitations and advantages of ceramics as a medium; his globalized, multicultural experiences and outlook; the European vanguard in ceramics; periodicals and publications of interest; writers of interest: Edmund de Waal, Jorunn Veiteberg, Janet Koplos; the "desire society"; curating Third Biennale for Israeli Ceramics, 2004; fusion art, craft, and design; "Object Factory: The Art of Industrial Ceramics," Gardiner Museum, Toronto, 2008; redefinition of the concept of the object.
Biographical / Historical:
Marek Cecula (1944- ) is a ceramist and designer, who lives and works in New York and Poland.
General:
Originally recorded on 3 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 10 digital wav files. Duration is 4 hr., 55 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Restrictions:
For information on how to access this interview contact Reference Services.
University of California, San Diego. Department of Anthropology Search this
Extent:
9.6 Linear feet ((24 boxes))
12 Sound recordings
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Sound recordings
Field notes
Photographic prints
Slides (photographs)
Psychological tests
Place:
Israel
Ifalik Atoll (Micronesia)
Burma
Date:
1943-2003, undated
Summary:
Melford E. Spiro was a psychological anthropologist whose career included fieldwork on the Pacific Atoll of Ifaluk, on kibbutzim in Israel, and in Burma. His research topics included child rearing, cooperation, aggression, and supernatural beliefs. His papers, dated 1943-2003, primarily document these periods of fieldwork in relation to these topics. The collection consists of field notes, personality data and analysis, photographs, interview tapes and transcriptions, ephemera, subject card files, and research files. It also includes limited material related to his teaching and writings in the form of course outlines and research, lecture notes, annotated articles, drafts, and book reviews.
Scope and Contents:
The Melford E. Spiro papers, 1943-2003, primarily document his periods of field work on the Ifaluk Atoll, on kibbutzim in Israel, and in Burma. The collection consists of field notes, personality data and analysis, photographs, interview tapes and transcriptions, ephemera, subject card files, and research files. It also includes limited material related to his teaching and writings in the form of course outlines and research, lecture notes, annotated articles, drafts, and book reviews.
The collection includes a great deal of the data Spiro collected at all three field sites, including Rorschach and Thematic Apperception tests (TAT) and the subsequent analysis, sentence completions, drawings by children, and autobiographies of informants. The majority of the interview transcriptions and questionnaires in the collection are from Israel and are written in Hebrew. Translations in English do not exist within this collection. The photographs include black-and-white snapshots of people and landscapes on Ifaluk and color slides taken in Burma and other locations in Southeast Asia.
Arrangement:
This collection is arranged in 4 series: Series 1. Ifaluk, 1947-1988, undated; Series 2. Israel, 1951-1981, undated; Series 3. Burma, 1943-1978, undated; Series 4. Teaching and writing, 1953-2003, undated.
Biographical Note:
Chronology
1920 April 26 -- Melford Spiro born in Ohio
circa 1942 -- BA Philosophy, University of Minnesota
circa 1942 -- Studied at Jewish Theological Seminary in New York
1947-1948 -- Field work in Ifaluk (Caroline Islands atoll)
1950 -- PhD in Anthropology, Northwestern University
1950 -- Start of field work in Israel
1950-1957 -- Taught at Washington University, St. Louis, the University of Connecticut, and the University of Washington
1957 -- Began teaching at the University of Chicago
1961-1962 -- Field work in Burma
1968 -- Started at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) as a founding member of the Anthropology department
1968-1972 -- Chair of the Anthropology department at UCSD
1969-1972 -- Summers: Worked with Burmese refugees in Thailand
1975 -- Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
1982 -- Appointed UCSD's first holder of the Presidential Chair
1982 -- Elected to the National Academy of Sciences
1990 -- Retired from UCSD
2014 October 18 -- Died in La Jolla, CA
Melford E. Spiro was a psychological anthropologist whose career included fieldwork on the Pacific Atoll of Ifaluk, on kibbutzim in Israel, and in Burma. His research topics included child rearing, cooperation, aggression, and supernatural beliefs. He was renowned for his "careful, insightful, and insistent emphasis upon motivational and psychological underpinnings of human behavior…and upon the need to take them into account in cross-cultural analysis." (Jordan)
While a PhD student at Northwestern University, Spiro was introduced to psychological anthropology by A. Irving Hallowell, who became a lifelong mentor and friend. After receiving his PhD in 1950, he went on to teach at Washington University in St. Louis, and the Universities of Connecticut, Washington, and Chicago before becoming the founding chair of the anthropology department at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) in 1968. He recruited the department's first faculty members in 1969 including Roy D'Andrade, Marc J. Swartz, Theodore Schwartz, Robert I. Levy, David K. Jordon, and Joyce Bennett Justus. Spiro also received training in psychoanalysis after arriving in San Diego and practiced as a lay analyst while establishing links to the medical school to provide anthropology graduate students with general psychiatric training.
Spiro served terms as president of the American Ethnological Society and the Society for Psychological Anthropology (SPA). He was one of the founders of Ethos, the SPA's journal. He was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and was the recipient of two Guggenheim fellowships and an Einstein Fellowship from the Israel Academy of Science. He also received an Excellence-in-Teaching award from the Chancellor's Associates at UCSD based on his mentoring of anthropology graduate students.
Sources consulted:
Jordan, David K. "In Memoriam, Melford E. Spiro." Anthropology News 56, no. 11-12 (December 2015): 26-27.
Avruch, Kevin. "Biographical Memoirs, Melford E. Spiro." National Academy of Sciences. 2015. Accessed April 4, 2016. http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/spiro-melford.pdf.
Related Materials:
Film and sound reels have been transferred to the Smithsonian's Human Studies Film Archive, HSFA.2016.09.
Provenance:
These papers were donated to the National Anthropological Archives by Melford Spiro's son, Jonathan Spiro, in 2015.
Restrictions:
The Melford E. Spiro papers are open for research.
Access to the Melford E. Spiro papers requires an appointment.
Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice.
Series 2 documents Spiro's field work with Israeli kibbutzim beginning in 1950 and continuing throughout his career. The materials date from 1951-1981 and include field notes, personality data and analysis, interviews, transcriptions and questionnaires, ephemera, and a subject card file.
The personality data includes drawings by children, Rorschach tests, and sentence completions. Some of the notations on the materials are in Hebrew and Arabic. The interview transcriptions and questionnaires are written in Hebrew. Translations in English do not exist within this collection. The series also contains 12 cassette tapes that were labeled as interview tapes, but it is not clear if they correlate to any of the transcriptions.
Arrangement:
Arranged in alphabetical order.
Collection Restrictions:
The Melford E. Spiro papers are open for research.
Access to the Melford E. Spiro papers requires an appointment.
Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice.
Collection Rights:
Contact the repository for terms of use.
Collection Citation:
Melford E. Spiro papers, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by the Wenner-Gren Foundation.
