JEMA pottery from Holland doesn’t mean a lot to most collectors in and out of Holland and very little has been this particular brand of pottery. Also I, having interest in Dutch 20th century pottery and having read a variety of books on Dutch pottery, had even never heard of it only until a few years ago on a trip to South Africa.
On a local market about 3 years ago I bought three lustre pieces that were a bit over the top but actually quite striking, detailed and well made, all three of them reading 'JEMA Holland' engraved in the base and a number. Searching for more information on Jema resulted in almost nothing and through a collectors bookstore I found out that there was probably no book written about it. After some more research I decided this brand of pottery really deserved a place in Dutch pottery history, between many different pieces many of them well detailed resembling for example Beswick animal figurines, others very similar to the ‘Hummel’ figurines ( more about that later) and hundreds of large figurines that just catch the eye.
Strangely enough there is not so much interest for Jema pottery in Holland and I found the largest amount of collectors is in United Kingdom and Australia.
HISTORY
Only very little is known about the history of the JEMA pottery factory in Holland. This website is meant to be a dynamic tool to hopefully gather more information and get a more complete view of the JEMA story before the information gets lost forever.
In August of 1942 a man called Jelis Mager ( born 12/06/1912 in Rotterdam, Netherlands) and his brother Johan Willem Mager ( born 09/02/1919 also in Rotterdam) and now both living in Maastricht, a city in the south of Holland, took over an existing partnership there from a Mr. J. Meussen; this partnership had been existing since 1920.
The registration in the chamber of commerce followed on the 4th of May 1945,only just after the Second World War. They started a ceramic studio at the 'Heer aan de Demerstraat' in Maastricht. On the 27th of April 1953 this small business moved to the 'Fort Willem Way' also in Maastricht. On the 25th of November 1955 the original partnership was broken up and the two brothers founded the JEMA KERAMISCH ATELIER N.V. (jema ceramic studio), the first JE standing for Jelis and MA standing for Mager.
The main objective of this partnership was the production of and trade of ceramic objects, doing all the necessary and making all agreements related to that activity; in general continuing the business created by former members. The starting capital was said to be Fl.1.200.000 (Guilders), quite a sum for those days. So since the 25th of November 1955 jema was officially in business. It can be stated that it was a real family business. There is no information about how many people were employed but on management level in old registers family related members are mentioned in the course of many the years. In August of 1958 a 'Hendrik Mager' became Co-Director. On the 1st of April 1963 Jelis Mager retired followed by his brother Johan Willem on the 8th of April 1977. In October 1977 the company got a new director by the name of Adolf Gustaaf Wiemer who apparently was a relative of Hendrik Mager. Hendrik Mager retired on the 20th of October 1982 and was followed up by Jacobus Wiemer. On the 28th of June 1984 the company was declared insolvent and had to close its doors.
In 2007 according to the information of the 'vereniging Maastricht's aardewerk' ( club for earthenware from Maastricht) visited an also closed factory ‘’CHEMKAFA’’ in Magraten in the south of Dutch Limburg and to their surprise amongst many moulds found all the old Jema moulds: a plaster cast has been made of every figurine. There has been talk about a rescue plan for these moulds but I have no recent information what has happened to them.
CLASSIFICATION
Much of Jema’s work is engraved on the base with the words 'Jema Holland' and a mould number. Some earlier work has a stamp 'Jema Holland' and some type of work has no back stamp at all such as most of the 'Hummel' like figurines.
Then also it is known that Jema produced work for other companies but I have no information what the names of these companies are but I do know that some work produced for others was back stamped with the name of the ordering company. I will reserve a section in the galleries of the pottery Jema made for other factories.
How to recognise a Jema piece?
The best clue is the back stamp which is usually engraved under the glaze. Many times this engraving is very superficial or is covered by a lot of glaze and hardly visible. The word 'Jema' is in a handwritten style and the word 'Holland' is in printed letters, always in the same way.
I have seen up to 3 digit numbers into the nine hundreds and taking into consideration the also many not numbered pieces I estimate that the collection consists of over a thousand different pieces.
Apart from that many figurines exist in from slightly different to complete different colour schemes.
The numbers are only partially chronological (mainly low numbers) and also some numbers appear to have been used more than once in different series they made like for example fish or horses.
The items with a black stamp (mostly earlier work or figurines) are fully in printed letters. A very great amount of the Jema work has a shiny or lustre glaze. Many times the bases are quite chunky with a sort of moss green to simulate leaves, grass or greenery.
Big parts of the work are animal figurines, some religious figurines, many 'Hummel' like figurines, over a hundred clock figurines, very few vases.
About the 'Hummel' figurines I have heard that the Jema factory was sued by the German Goebel factory that made (and still make today) the original Hummel figurines because of the great similarity to the originals and the Jema Company lost the process.
In the Seventies and Eighties Jema made quite a few quite fashionable pieces for the time. This is a very general description since Jema through the years has made so many different pieces but the gallery will be very helpful. I have tried to divide the work in to categories which are not necessarily chronological and also do not coincide completely with the numbers. Some work can be placed into time by its style and sometimes by the low numbering but most Jema work has excellent glaze that shows no crazing over time and is not a clue to determine the age of the piece. There are a lot of photographs but many are still missing and you are very welcome to send us more pictures. I had a lot of help from Dutch collector Johan Molhuizen who provided me with lists of items that were known to him. The categories I created are the following: Animals, Aquatic (Fresh water fish and marine life), Birds, Dogs and Cats, Deer and Stags, Horses, Figurines (Hummel, Religious, Female), Clocks, Wall, Black and Miscellaneous.
