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Lewis Jarvis Harvey was born at Wantage, Berkshire, England on 16 June 1871, the second son of the six children born to Enos James Harvey (an iron moulder and engineer) and his wife Elizabeth née Jarvis. The family migrated to Australia in 1874 and settled in Brisbane. After attending the Kangaroo Point School Harvey worked as a telegram boy until he was given lessons in woodcarving by Edward G. Madley and Cuthbert Vickers and subsequently enrolled at the Brisbane Technical College. During this time he studied drawing with J. A. Clarke and later R. Godfrey Rivers. Harvey opened his own business as a wood and stone carver in North Quay in 1892 and transferred the business to George Street c.1898. Harvey became a part-time teacher of woodcarving at the Brisbane Technical College in 1902 and when amalgamated with the South Brisbane Technical College and West End Technical College to form the Central Technical College in 1909 he taught modelling. In 1916 Harvey closed his business to take up full-time teaching at the Central Technical College from 1 August and at the same time began giving evening classes in pottery.

On 5 January 1898 Harvey married Fanny Ellen Keal and children Elsie, Thelma, George and Elvin were born in 1900, 1902, 1903 and 1913 respectively.

A ceramic in a family collection in the United States is dated 1914, two years prior to the introduction of his pottery classes at the Central Technical College. It seems his involvement with teaching pottery was at the suggestion of Mrs Lucy Pearson of the Arts and Crafts Society of Brisbane. Apart from the individual quality of his own work, Harvey’s major contribution to the development of ceramics in Australia is the series of 20 exercises with which he taught his students and subsequently in his school of ceramics that became the largest in Australia. While his strict method of training ensured his students produced ceramics of a high level of competence, he did not encourage experimentation. Harvey, however, was a gentle instructor and his engaging personality and sense of humour was fondly recalled by many of his former students. He taught remedial arts and crafts to returned serviceman during both world wars.

Harvey was intimately involved in the Brisbane art scene throughout his life. He was appointed to the Selection Committee of the Queensland Art Society in 1926 and made a life member in 1933. L. J. Harvey exhibited wood carving and sculpture at the annual exhibitions of the Queensland Art Society, later the Royal Queensland Art Society (RQAS), between 1907 and 1948 and pottery for the first time with a group of his students in 1917. He exhibited pottery subsequently in 1919, 1920 and collections of pottery in 1925-41 together with some sculptural ceramic works. Harvey was appointed to the Queensland Art Gallery’s art advisory committee in 1938 and served until 1945.

He exhibited woodcarvings at the Arts and Crafts Society of Brisbane from 1914 and pottery 1919 to 1941 when he transferred his interest to the newly established Half Dozen Group of Artists. The Society, which ceased to function during World War I, was reformed at a meeting at Harvey’s studio in 1922. He served on the committee for many years, largely as a selector. His works at the Arts and Crafts Society in Brisbane (and indeed the RQAS) were always favourably commended but in terms such as '. . . too well known to require comment’ so specific mention of his pottery is rare. Exceptions to this occur in 1928 when a reviewer from the Courier-Mail described 'The colouring and modelling on the kookaburras on certain pieces . . . merit special attention, and another admirable specimen is a purple and deep blue vase with an Australian design in high relief.’ In 1929 another, Brisbane’s The Telegraph, comments 'Among the several pieces of pottery displayed, pride of place must be given to two delightful little potpourri jars and an interesting china head set on a coloured stand.’ Harvey was essentially the only ceramist in Brisbane to produce figurative or sculptural pieces. A reviewer in 1930, in an unidentified press cutting, specifically mentions 'a float bowl in rich mulberry brown and rose showing crabs and other sea creatures in high relief while the central figure is a mermaid.’

Harvey introduced examples of his pottery to the Sydney public in 1922 through the New Art Salon and in May that year the Sydney Telegraph reported: '. . . the students who are instructed by Mr L. J. Harvey have the advantage of getting near Brisbane clays in natural colours, from which they are able to get rich effects of tone. In some of these there is a variety of colours, and, when they are baked and glazed they have the effect of coloured marble or the texture of agate.’ This was designated 'Harvian Ware’ and so marked but it is now rarely found. The clear greenish glaze of this group of work was made of ground optical glass. The use of natural coloured Queensland clays in formalised designs became a distinct aspect of the School.

Harvey himself was aware of the significance of his pottery classes within an Australian context as he insisted his students inscribe all their works with a 'Q’ or 'QLD”. He offered the Board of Trustees of the Art Gallery of New South Wales a selection of the work of his and his students in 1923 but the offer, unfortunately, was not accepted. Harvey presented a group of his small miniature pieces to the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, Sydney [now Powerhoue Museum]. It was not until 1938 that the Queensland Art Gallery accepted a small double scraffito vase (together with a bronze bust of his daughter Elsie) presented by friends and students of the potter to commemorate his retirement for the Central Technical College at the end of the previous year. Harvey then set up a private craft school at Horsham House, 331 Adelaide Street, Brisbane where he taught until his death. Harvey died while attending a meeting of the Royal Queensland Art Society on 19 July 1949. The L. J. Harvey Memorial prize for Drawing, established in his honour, was awarded at the Queensland Art Gallery 1950-83.

Queensland Art Gallery: Research Curator, Queensland Heritage

Writers:

Cooke, Glenn R. Note: Research Curator, Queensland Heritage, Queensland Art Gallery

Date written:

2003

Last updated:

2011