When I was a boy, I read (and was captivated by) a book by Eleanor Cameron titled The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet. Published in 1954, it followed the adventures of two California boys who responded to a mysterious classified ad in the newspaper. The boys built a rocketship (as the ad requested) and brought it to one Mr. Tyco Bass, a funny little (greenish) man who sent them on a mission to an otherwise unknown planet. While I never did become an enthusiastic science fiction reader, little webs of this story settled into the crevices of my memory and peak-out now and then. One such moment was upon finding the Ruscha West German vase, shown above. Although it is not green, the veiny-reddish glazing makes me think of the bald head of a humanoid space creature, possibly on the Mushroom Planet. What’s more, the UFO-inspired shape of the vase heightens the alien sensibility. Designed and made in the 1960’s, it’s quite possible that this vase is the creation of a ceramicist who had read the very book which captivated me almost 50 years ago.
Please come into the shop to see this handsome piece—and the rest of our recent European shipments—or click on the photo above to learn more about it.
Tomorrow: more from our recent shipments of European art pottery.
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