Pottery

Major two-day catalog auctions next weekend will offer a study in the contrasting styles of American furniture and appointments. Both sales will feature items expected to bring five-figure prices. Beginning at 6 p.m. next Friday, Pook & Pook Inc. will offer more than 300 lots of 18th- and 19th-century furniture, art and accessories at the first session of a 900-lot sale that includes Pennsylvania cabinetry, quilts, and other local crafts, as well as furniture from other regions.

To get to the books at Burlington County Library, you have to go by the art. In the lobby this month are oils and prints and New Jersey redware. Paul Gordon of Moorestown, a retired dentist, said, "I'm doing all the fun things I didn't have time to do while I was practicing" - painting, music, writing. In the lobby gallery is an eclectic group of his artwork, still lifes, portraits, genre scenes, and more than a dozen of his "Read" paintings - portraits of famous Americans with "whimsical sayings of what they might say about reading," he said.

The Far West will be evoked at a pair of two-day sales next week. In Chadds Ford, William H. Bunch Auctions & Appraisals will offer almost 300 lots of American Indian pottery and decorative arts. And in Hatfield, Alderfer Auction Co. will be selling the last will and testament of the leader of the Mormon pioneers in Utah, Brigham Young. Young's will, along with a number of other autograph documents, will be sold at the start of the first session of the Alderfer sale, beginning at 1 p.m. Wednesday at the auction center, 501 Fairgrounds Rd. Dated Sept.

It was the same routine every year. Fourth of July week, we'd pack up the car and the rooftop cargo holder and head for Sea Isle City. And each year, our family trip was twice delayed: lunch at the Green Terrace on the Black Horse Pike, then fresh-fruit buying at Carmen's produce stand. From a kid's point of view, the detours could be maddening: Get us to the beach! But the pit stops made for nice breaks in what could have seemed a never-ending car ride - and they became part of our Shore tradition.

No doubt, Robert Kugler says, there are lots of people who wonder just who was the potter who once lived on Haddonfield's Potter Street. But most Haddonfield residents, believes Kugler, who has lived in the community since 1950, are likely to forget the question once they get off the street, one of Haddonfield's oldest. Not Kugler. For 30 years he has collected pottery made in Haddonfield, and as a history buff, he has made it a point to find out who those potters were.

Three major two-day gallery sales will take place over the next week, offering in addition to fine furniture and paintings such diverse items as ancient pottery and a narwhal skull that stands almost eight feet tall. One of the more noteworthy pieces of furniture is a centennial pedestal dining room table with three leaf inserts that will be offered at tomorrow's session of a two-day auction at the Barry S. Slosberg Inc. gallery, 2501 E. Ontario St. Such tables are generically referred to as Empire Revival, but Slosberg associate Rob Goldstein said this one may have been made by Daniel Pabst, a Philadelphia furniture-maker in the 1870s and '80s associated with high-style Eastlake.

Peter Paone is accomplished in many things, but following orders is not one of them. Recognized for his unusual artistic abilities at an early age, he has rarely taken pointers about his work since then - from anyone, teachers and influential artists included. Paone's "imaginary watercolors," a little-known aspect of his career, are the focus just now of an exhibition at the Michener Museum in Doylestown. In the strange, dreamlike world that Paone has created in the 18 works on view, his human subjects are of a decidedly edgy sort and frequently veer toward the surreal and the fantastic.

In a creative blending of art, science and history, students at Palisades High School in Nockamixon produced a project that caught the eye of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and garnered $12,000 in grants. Their handiwork - a collection of Japanese pottery and poetry - is exhibited at the museum through Oct. 10. "It's one of the best examples of interdisciplinary curriculum I've ever seen," said Barbara Bassett, who has been with the Art Museum since the late 1980s. "The kids are really turned on, making the connections between all the subject areas.

The autumn auction season will open in style next weekend with two two-day sales devoted to big-ticket items. One will focus on English and Continental items, the other on the Arts and Crafts movement. Ushering them in on Monday will be a third sale of fine decorative items, including a sterling silver lunch box. The English and Continental items will be offered by Freeman's next Saturday and Sunday at its gallery at 1808 Chestnut St. More than 1,000 items will be sold, beginning with 259 lots of furniture and winding up with such items as sconces, clocks, urns and statuary.

Beginning with an important sale of Rookwood pottery today in Central Jersey, auctions through next weekend will offer a variety of popular collectibles. The Rookwood, 149 lots of it, will be offered by David Rago at noon at his gallery at 333 N. Main St., in Lambertville. Today's sale will be complemented by a second sale of Roseville/Zanesville pottery and Victorian majolica at noon tomorrow. The Rookwood was consigned by Toni Schulman of New York, who began collecting it more than 30 years ago. Rookwood was considered the top of the line in hand-painted Arts and Crafts ceramics for much of the company's existence, according to Rago.