Edward Marshall Boehm

Edward Marshall Boehm (pronounced: beam) was reared and educated near Baltimore, Maryland, where he first developed an interest in the observation and sketching of animals and birds. At sixteen, he left school to find work as a cattle manager, and while exhibiting prize stock at shows in Long Island, New York, began modeling figures of dogs and horses in clay. Desiring to give his sculpture permanence and color, he undertook the study of ceramics, particularly the art of porcelain, in which he excelled. At a studio in Trenton, New Jersey, he produced many of the pieces for which he is best known. In 1954 Boehm’s wife Helen, who acted as his commercial agent, presented a casting of one of his animal figures to Mamie Eisenhower at the White House. From this time forward Boehm’s proficiency and talent as an artist began to be widely recognized, and the number of porcelains he produced greatly increased. Finest of all his works is a large series of colored figures of American birds, issued in limited editions, and now much sought after by collectors. All of Boehm’s work was designed by him and fired and decorated by artists specially trained by Mr. Boehm. Many of his bird figures are derived from captured, live specimens at the Boehm aviary and gardens on the Delaware River, where Boehm died of a heart attack in January, 1969. Notable examples of his work are owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Great Britain’s royal family, and the family of the late President Richard M. Nixon. Probably the largest single collection of his porcelain bird creations belongs to the Stark Museum of Art in Orange, Texas.