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Weathervane Teapot by Peter Shire / American Art
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Weathervane Teapot

1981 Peter Shire Born: Los Angeles, California 1947 glazed ceramic and wood overall: 12 1/2 x 15 3/4 x 5 1/2 in. (31.8 x 40.0 x 14.0 cm) Smithsonian American Art Museum Gift of Donna and John Donaldson in memory of Jean and John Michael on the occasion of the Fifteenth Anniversary of the James Renwick Alliance and the Twenty-fifth Anniversary of the Renwick Gallery 1997.109.24A-B Smithsonian American Art Museum
4th Floor, Luce Foundation Center



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Weathervane Teapot
from American Art staff



"However crazy and fanciful my work appears, I'm still held by function. The teapots I make are borderline, however. They're more involved with a group of shapes and a material." Artist quoted in Artists Design Furniture, 1984


Peter Shire's teapots are constructions of color and shapes built out of slabs of clay. Weathervane Teapot is a balancing act of three-dimensional squares and balls, with squiggly rods and hollow tubes. He hoped that his whimsical pots would break down traditional, class-conscious ideas about "tea-time," making it a practice accessible to all. This teapot asks to be picked up, but leaves us wondering where we should hold it to pour the tea, or if it is capable of pouring at all. Shire stopped making clay teapots in 1985, devoting his time thereafter to building furniture.

For more information about this work visit the Luce Foundation Center.


Keywords

Abstract

decorative arts - ceramic

Crafts - Clay

ceramic

wood

About Peter Shire

Born: Los Angeles, California 1947

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