The beautiful tea bowl is finely handcrafted by artist Annette Lindenberg using kurinuki, the traditional Japanese technique of carving from a single block of clay. The tea bowl is glazed Lindenberg’s pale blue glaze, playfully applied to show variation in the colour tone of the glaze. More evenly applied glaze on the smooth interior of the bowl shows a faint hint of a lilac hue, reflected in the exterior by the thicker application of glaze by the edges of the kurinuki cuts. Its asymmetric fuller bellied form plays into a sense of conviviality as its form fits into cupped palms, even as the roughness in texture and cut edges reveals a grittiness in the raw material.
The piece elegantly treads a balance between delicate softness and jagged roughness, reflecting the artist’s interest in natural geomorphic forms and influence from the Japanese aesthetic theory of wabi-sabi – an appreciation for beauty in imperfection. This combination results in a mesmerising rawness and warmth that is simultaneously intimate and subliminal. The unglazed bottom exhibits the original rough clay body, finished with the neat maker’s mark.
About the Artist:
Annette Lindenberg is a German/British ceramicist, originally from Austria, whose work focuses on Kurinuki, the Japanese method of hollowing and carving blocks of clay. Prior to her MA, Annette graduated from Cardiff Metropolitan University with a BA in Artist: Designer Maker. She has exhibited at the British Art Fair at Saatchi and the London Art Fair with the gallery Modern Clay.
