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Visual Arts :: Art That Pours An enjoyable new exhibition celebrates the teapot as an object of art as well as a means for quenching thirst. "The Artful Teapot," at the Peabody Essex Museum. by Adrienne LaFrance
The teapots on display range from the unconventional to the loud, the erotic to the absurd, the bejeweled to the simple, the grotesque to the playful. Some escape easy categorization: teapots are made of U.S. currency and covered with bottle caps. One resembles a detonator. The exhibit also features the world's most popular teapot, "The Cube," made famous in its debut on ocean liners in the early 1900s. Predictably, the relationship between craft and technology varies throughout the exhibit. The most traditional pieces were created in China during the 16th century; the latest gizmos include a portable teapot that can be plugged into a car lighter. Eschewing practicality, the wildest, largest teapots look like tall towers with intricate pulley systems. Some resemble donuts, with holes where their bodies should be. Initially, the exhibit encourages a sense of whimsy. Contributing to the fun is how the pieces pick up on pop culture of the centuries, from the kitsch of the present, such as the likeness of Mr. Potato Head ("Mr. Spuds," 1997), to the camp of the Victorian age, including an effeminate Oscar Wilde ("Aesthetic Teapot," 1881-82). But what makes "The Artful Teapot" so intriguing is the profundity that lurks beneath its humor. The show exudes a surrealistically playful quality, since it revolves around the radical reinvention of a shape with which most people are already well-acquainted. The teapot can be altered to an almost unrecognizable extent, but it works, at least as long as the imaginative viewer can still determine handle from spout.
The evolution of the teapot suggests that a commonplace household object can serve as a work of art, a piece of satire, and a sign of status all at once. Throughout the exhibit, the domestic becomes grand or surreal; the large or powerful is often reduced to the ordinary. For example, "Detonator T," (1997) turns a tool for creating explosions into a perfect fit for tea time. That some of the exhibit's teapots are functional and others are not suggests another fascinating paradox. Artists who managed to create pieces that approached, but didn't breach, the limits of functionality are to be respected. But the more outlandish teapots, those that were several feet tall, vibrantly dreamlike and as far from useful as possible offer a special flavor of their own. The latter beg a philosophical question -- can it still be deemed a teapot if it can never be used to pour tea? Sometimes a teapot sends a political message, as when artists depict famous leaders and even corporations. One can't help but think that the fast food industry is being ridiculed by "Kentucky Fried Teapot" (1979), which features the body of a plucked chicken with the bearded and bespectacled head of the company's founder Colonel Harland Sanders. Many of the teapots are personifications -- handles become ears and spouts become noses or genitalia. "Blue Boy" and "Pinkie" embody another kind of social critique. Rose Misanchuk's creations are a glossy ceramic man and woman dressed conservatively, blue and pale pink respectively, with spouts between their legs. The man's points down and the woman's points up. The teapots wittily contrast the implicit constraints of the Victorian era with the gender bending of today: the result is a grotesque eroticism that's as intriguing as it is repellent. The potential for playful manipulation predictably invites specific lampoons; the great and powerful are minimized by putting them on a commonplace object. Turning the famous (and infamous) into teapots simultaneously humanizes and ridicules them. The mugs of Ronald Regan and Margaret Thatcher are caricatured on pots that bear their respective likenesses. The Teddy Roosevelt teapot features the former president as a cowboy on a horse. Even Elvis, Marilyn Monroe and Shirley Temple rate a teapot portrait. Still, the exhibit is not all silliness and satire. Many pieces are simple and elegant, such as "Celestial," in which the body of the teapot looks like a pale moon illuminating the bare branches of winter trees. Another simple yet highly original piece is Adrian Saxe's "Ampersand" (1988), in which the artist found an everyday symbol that naturally resonates with the contour of a traditional teapot. Historical context is prevalent throughout the exhibit. A bright and rounded airplane-shaped teapot titled "Red Baron" (1939) was an unknown British artist's representation of the World War II era. Popular nursery rhymes are celebrated in two 1930 pieces that depict Humpty Dumpty atop his wall and the old lady who lived in a shoe. Many teapots in the collection echo famous works of art, such as the Mona Lisa. That the piece's handle depicts one giant ear, leaving the other side of her head bare, doesn't become weirdly poignant until you see the Vincent Van Gogh likeness on the other side. Another teapot is a sculpted tribute to surrealist Rene Magritte's famous "Ceci N'est Pas Une Pipe." In this case, Magritte's famous sentiment may seem less bizarre -- the piece isn't a pipe nor merely its likeness, but first and foremost a teapot. Taken at face value, "The Artful Teapot" proffers plenty of aesthetic enjoyment. Those sensitive to its historical and social ironies, though, will find much to think about in the exhibition's fanciful collisions between the useful and the imaginative, deliciously pleasurable lessons in what happens when art and the practical fight over who pours. "The Artful Teapot" exhibit will be on view at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA through March 5, 2006.
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