Craft Alliance Shows Teapots Short And Stout

Craft Alliance’s biennial teapot exhibition is one of the institution’s most popular events. This year, the show includes more than 80 clay teapots made by more than 60 potters.

The pots were chosen by master potter Fong Choo, who invited 20 artists and chose the rest from submissions. “I selected the works based on four criteria: strong form, great craftsmanship, skill in handling the medium and attention to detail,” Choo said. Potters from all over the country are featured.

In addition to being more or less functional — some of the pots might frustrate users — all the pots were required to fit within a 10-by-10-inch box.

Most of the potters responded to the challenge creatively. But other than function and size, the works demonstrate a full range of styles and techniques from relatively traditional to whimsical, from functional to sculptural. There are pots that bear images on their sides and others that aim to fool the eye into thinking that they are something other than what they are.

Although everyone has his or her own taste, I found a number of pots I wouldn’t mind owning. (Everything is for sale; prices range from $95 to $2,200.) Michael Sherrill’s elegant little pot looks like a chunk of wood from which the bark has been cut off in a spiral pattern. John Serrano’s trompe l’oeil pot, a contemporary expression of an ancient Chinese tradition, looks like a length of wood with the bark still on, “branches” serving as handle and spout.

Jeffrey Nichols has created a sturdy, no-nonsense pot with a beautiful layered glaze made by scraping away upper layers to reveal colors below its yellow surface. Scott Bennett produced the luxe ware for the show, a long, elegant pot with a stippled body and a gold luster handle. One of the most likable pieces is by Dan Anderson: Onto a traditionally fired pot with ash marks he has photo-transferred the familiar benign image of Chairman Mao as secular Buddha.

As a demonstration that ceramics will continue into the next generation as a medium of expression, Craft Alliance is also showing its second “Biennial High School Teapot Invitational” through June 1.

This article was taken from: stltoday.com