Project Description

This teapot has been first thrown on a pottery wheel and then altered to give the body its bulbous, fluted shape. It has a shino glaze, which creates the teapot’s varied, organic coloration. Shino glazes range in color from milky white to burnt orange and have been a favorite of potters for centuries. Charlie Cummings graduated from Berea College with a BA in Ceramics in 1995. Since then, Charlie Cummings has become a well-known studio artist and teacher, as well as director of the Charlie Cummings Gallery, which was established in 2001. The gallery features emerging ceramic artists, and also showcases how new technology and photography can be used with ceramics. Today, Cummings continues to create beautiful stoneware pottery and utilizes new media and techniques in his work. In a retrospective catalog of Berea College Ceramics, he is quoted as saying, “I want to thumb my nose at some of the silly ideas that are accepted as rules in ceramics.” His work is featured in public and private collections around the world, including that of the Dalai Lama. This piece of ceramic work came to the collection by gift of the artist to his alma mater, Berea College.

-Charla Hamilton, Class of 2015

Object Details

Charlie Cummings, 1973-
21st c.
2008.13.21
9 1/2" x 8 1/2" x 6 1/2"
Ceramics
Transferred from Ceramics Program, 2008