Tip me over, pour me out

“Teapots are like mirrors,” tea specialist Anna Somerville says.

When people come into her store, Acquired Taste Teas, “they’re looking for a mirror, a teapot that will represent them,” she says. “It’s not about possessions or showing off. It’s about who people are.”

Somerville stopped by the Alberta Craft Council this week to admire some of the teapots featured in Brew-haha, an exhibit opening Saturday that features more than 50 works from artisans across Western Canada.

Tea drinking is believed to have started in China more than 5,000 years ago and today, the service of tea endures as a cultural ceremony around the world. The teapot is symbolic of that ritual, Somerville says, calling to mind warmth, familiarity and socializing.

“Anything with a handle and a spout is appealing,” she says. “It perks up your energy.”

The council’s executive director, Tom McFall, says the asymmetry of a teapot is visually pleasing and humorous. But in addition to esthetics, the way a teapot pours is paramount.

“Many people like to audition the spout,” he says, “and check that the teapot is a good match.”

Most of the teapots at the exhibit are for sale, and many are functional. But some are more visual art than purposeful craft, including Barbara Tipton’s flattened teapots that hang on the wall. McFall calls them “potter puns” because they symbolize the clay a potter might throw against the wall when a project doesn’t work, while Somerville describes them as “teapots that couldn’t save the situation” because they remind her of failures in life — divorce, conversations gone wrong.

Tops on Somerville’s list? Potter Brad Keys’ simple clay teapots. Humble, even plain, the earth-coloured vessels won over the tea enthusiast, who describes them as distant cousins of a Brown Betty.

“It’s not imposing,” Somerville says, cradling one of Keys’ pots in her hands. “It doesn’t say, ‘I’m coming to your house.’ It says, ‘Take me to your house.’ ”

(this article was taken from canada.com)