Pieter Groeneveld was a ceramist poet and pottery manufacturer.Born in Batavia in 1889. He came to the Netherlands as a little boy, he trained as a painter at the National Academy in Amsterdam. In the beginning he had a broad interest in among other things sculpting and painting decorative panels and floral art but gradually he focused mainly on ceramics. In 1923 he opened a flower shop in The Hague where he also exhibited, here he also started making ceramics and had his first works fired at the Amphora tile factory. Two years later he started a workshop in Wassenaar and again two years later in Voorschoten. In 1938 the Groeneveldt pottery factory was founded there. This went bankrupt in 1973 and the factory was taken over by Delfos which itself went bankrupt in 1987.
After the Second World War he came up with new techniques and glaze combinations and he invented the travertine (bark) effect. These are glazes with a rough crusty surface. In his last years he worked from home with his life partner Jacques Huyser and made only one-offs. Pieter Groeneveldt died at the age of 93 in 1982.
He also made a number of House of Orange souvenirs. In 1948 for the golden jubilee of Queen Wilhelmina he designed a cup on which the “W” and the dates are embossed. We have been collecting for more than thirty years and you only come across this cup sporadically. Not many will have been made as it is handmade and not mass produced. As far as we know this cup is made in three colours dark red brown, deep blue and green. In 1962 he designed a beaker for the silver wedding anniversary of Queen Juliana and Prince Bernhard made in celadon green. This was made in greater numbers and thus will be more common at collectors fairs.
More information on this artist can be found on the website pietergroeneveldt.nl
Info from: wikipedia and pietergroenveldt.nl
