Lekythos ca. 1875-77 Chelsea Keramic Art Works The Chelsea Keramic Art Works was the first American ceramics firm to designate itself an "art pottery." It was founded in Chelsea, Massachusetts, by members of the Robertson family, all of whom had honed their skills in the ceramics industry in Britain before coming to this country. An early specialty of the firm was the reproduction of Ancient Greek pottery made fashionable by such English tastemakers as Charles Locke Eastlake. Chelsea's rich red clay was particularly well suited to Greek designs. By 1874 the firm was producing finely made copies of antique vases with decoration painted in black slip. One example imitates the form of a Greek Lekythos, several of which were in the published catalogue of the celebrated Engelfield Collection, with which the Robertson's were familiar. Unlike the decoration on the antique models by the firm, the ornamentation on the lekythos reflects the tenets of contemporary English Reform designers such as