Maureen's Molds

Maureen with some of her old molds

The plaster molds of Maureen's sculptures were another daunting task.  There was a mixture of very old and newer molds, and with many of Maureen's bird figures being life-size some molds were huge.  With only a few hours to sort through and choose either the sculpts that had never been seen before or any horses that still survived, they were then shipped across the country.  They were stored for 6 years until a few months ago, when I happened to read a blog post about some Hagen-Renaker mini mini horses.

Kristina Lucas Francis, an amazing commercial artist and potter who also specializes in equine art and sculptures, had posted about her research of an obscure subject on her Muddy Hoofprints blog titled Without a Leg to Stand On, involving Hagen-Renaker's mini mini horse family (barely an inch tall) sculpted by Maureen Love in the 1950s!  It was the start of an amazing set of coincidences there that finally convinced us she was the only person who could bring those old molds to life.  Maureen had been a wonderful mentor of Kristina's, would patiently look at and critique her teen-age drawings and sculptures, and had become Kristina's subject of much study and research.  She and her husband Paul Francis, who specializes in mold making and casting also, were the perfect combination of talent to handle the old fragile plaster molds and recast them for the project.

Dawn and Kristina with some of the molds

Paul Francis restoring some of the old molds

Share The Love, with the permission of the Maureen Love estate, will be creating new pieces from these old molds of Maureen Love sculptures - many which have never been seen before and some which were produced in very small numbers originally.  They will each be Limited Editions and come with Certificates of Authenticity.  It is our intention to try and do justice to Maureen's sculptures and style of decorating, but her way of using high fired stoneware clays she had dug herself and her individual detailing was of course unique to her but is our inspiration.

The Beginning of Share the Love - a Day With Maureen

Maureen Love admiring her Angels Trumpet tree

She was born in National City, California in May of 1922, and so was named Maureen May Love.  Her parents, Tom Love and Sarah Aileen Specht, I've come to know only through the charming cards Maureen made for them as a child at Easter, birthdays and the like, and the delicate drawings of them as they grew older.  They were very often shown with their pets, and Maureen certainly inherited that love of animals and nature from them.  Maureen's mother had been a china painter, and the love of painting and ceramics is another thing that Sarah may have passed along to her daughter.

Maureen's pencil sketch of her mother and dog

Maureen was compelled to draw and sculpt, although that seems such a powerful word to use in describing the gentle, quiet, humble woman that she was.   She drew as a very young child, took art classes and was the art editor in high school, won local and California state art contests, and then went on to win national competitions sponsored by Higgins and Strathmore.  She also won a 9 month scholarship to the California School of Fine Art.  As the director of that prestigious art school wrote in a 1940 letter to the director of the Fine Arts Gallery in San Diego:

     "Concerning the young lady, Miss Maureen Love, in whom you are interested: she must have exceptional ability to obtain such recognition of her work with so little training and experience.  I heartily agree with you that it would be a shame if she were not able to continue when her work gives such promise.... I will keep her case in mind for anything that we may be able to do and will be glad to personally see that her work receives full consideration."

 Maureen went on to work during WWII as a steel welder, which helped her fabricate metal legs and parts for her stoneware ceramic sculptures of birds and animals later in her life.  She sculpted animals professionally for the Hagen-Renaker Potteries in southern California for over 50 years until her passing in 2004.  She also created her own work in primarily stoneware she called Maureen Love Originals and later in life under the names Made With Love and Molds From Maureen's Garage.  She was meticulous with keeping her time on her personal artwork separate from her employer's time.  There have been several wonderful books on the Hagen-Renaker Potteries works, and another great book of Maureen Love's life and work written by Nancy Kelly for Schiffer Books.

I was fortunate to meet and spend time with Maureen during several visits over the years while helping photograph and document her art for Nancy Kelly's books.  The sculptures we could find were documented for the most part, but Maureen's drawings and sketchbooks had only been intermittently photographed.  Maureen's estate generously allowed the entirety of her sketchbooks and drawings to be photographed, inventoried and preserved - a huge task with close to 2000 drawings.

It is our hope in time to share them with her fans, so, towards this goal, Share The Love was created.

 Maureen's estate also eventually allowed access to her sculpture molds, which were believed by everyone to have been destroyed.  I was able to rescue some of them.