In historic move, MFA Boston returns works by 19th-century enslaved artist David Drake to his heirs

In a very rare and likely precedent-setting agreement, the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) Boston has agreed to return two works from 1857 by the Black potter David Drake, who made his ambitious jars while enslaved, to his present-day descendants.

David Drake (c. 1800 – c. 1870s), also known as “Dave Pottery” and “Dave the Potter”, was an American potter who lived in Edgefield, South Carolina. An enslaved African American, Drake spent most of his life working for his masters, but became free at the end of the American Civil War. He is thought to have died in the 1870s.

Drake produced alkaline-glazed stoneware jugs between the 1820s and the 1870s. He often signed his works “Dave”, and he is recognized as the first enslaved potter to inscribe his work. Drake inscribed his work with poetry, often using rhyming couplets, as well as his signature. During the time in which he was working, most enslaved people were illiterate especially in South Carolina, as a result of anti-literacy laws, making his inscriptions particularly notable.

“I Wonder Where is all my Relation.”

Dave the Potter, his poem jars are part of ‘Hear Me Now’ at MFA in Boston https://youtu.be/Fy9Yee9s01w?si=fHIqiGnozzxuvuy1 – The Boston Globe – 3/8/2023

One jar made in 1857 has a particularly wrenching inscription in light of Drake’s forced separation from a woman believed to be his wife and her two sons. That vessel, at the Greenville County Museum of Art in South Carolina, reads: “I wonder where is all my relation.”

One of Drake’s great-great-great-great grandsons, the children’s book author and producer Yaba Baker, said he feels the restitution process offers one answer to that question. “It’s been exciting, overwhelming and feels full circle,” he said in a video call. He praised the MFA for “showing integrity and leadership” in “allowing us to connect to Dave’s legacy,” noting that “to go from being slaves to having a family of engineers and doctors and people in executive positions is a testament to Dave’s legacy in a different way.”

By Jori Finkel | CNN – 10/30/2025