I’ve reached out to the larger community to try to find pieces made by Tom and Mary and I’ve met some wonderful people who have volunteered to let me take photographs of the pieces that they have. I’ve been busy with other projects, so it will take some time to sort through all of the pictures that I’ve taken and to post them to the appropriate galleries. The piece that is the subject of this post has been posted in the gallery of Mary’s Abstract pieces, but I wanted to share the story behind the piece.

I’m not really sure when it was made, but my best guess is in the mid-1990s. It is about 14″ high and 20″ wide and is mounted on 1/4″ plywood. It was purchased by Ruth Stanley, a well-known artist in Miami and a good friend of Mary’s for many years. It hung by her front door but because it was mounted on such thin plywood, the weight of the piece pulling on the wire hanger, which was fastened to the plywood by screw-eyes, bowed the plywood and the ceramic cracked. Ruth Stanley died on August 9, 2012, when she was almost 96 years old. I saw this piece at the estate sale, but did not buy it because it was so badly cracked. A very dedicated and savvy collector did buy the piece though, took it to a professional restorer and now the piece looks like it just came out of the kiln. The restorer did a marvelous job and I’m very happy that the collector took the time and spent the money to have the piece restored. Only a knowledgeable collector would have known that this piece was made by Mary Blakley – there is an “mb” stamp about 2/3 of the way across the bottom of the first panel. It is filled with glaze and obscured, but the collector had a sharp eye and made a great buy. The other reason is to express my appreciation to the collector for saving the piece from the trash pile – it may well have ended up there.