Anchorage
Teapot
1982 (designed), 1982 (made)
1982 (designed), 1982 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
Since the 1970s, Peter Shire (b. 1947) has been working at an intersection. Where craft, fine art, and industrial design collide, he has built his career, drawing freely from each area without taking any of it too seriously. He has had forays into architecture, furniture, and fashion, but he keeps returning to ceramics. Like his home and studio in the Los Angeles suburb of Echo Park, clay is one medium he knows he will never leave.
Shire’s early teapots were also significant because they attracted the eye of Ettore Sottsass, one of the founders of Memphis, an international design movement that came out of Italy during the 1980s. Sottsass found Shire’s teapots “fresh, witty, and full of information for the future”, and the members of Memphis agreed. The group, which sought to revitalize design by rejecting conventional standards in favor of a bold, colourful, novel approach to product design, invited Shire to Milan to work with them. This lead to a series of projects that toyed with the intersections of industrial design and fine art, and gave Shire the opportunity to work in glass, metal and other new mediums.
Shire’s early teapots were also significant because they attracted the eye of Ettore Sottsass, one of the founders of Memphis, an international design movement that came out of Italy during the 1980s. Sottsass found Shire’s teapots “fresh, witty, and full of information for the future”, and the members of Memphis agreed. The group, which sought to revitalize design by rejecting conventional standards in favor of a bold, colourful, novel approach to product design, invited Shire to Milan to work with them. This lead to a series of projects that toyed with the intersections of industrial design and fine art, and gave Shire the opportunity to work in glass, metal and other new mediums.
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Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Parts | This object consists of 2 parts.
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| Title | Anchorage (manufacturer's title) |
| Materials and techniques | Electroplated nickel silver, lacquered brass and painted wooden details, the body and top spun and plated |
| Brief description | Teapot, electroplated nickel silver, lacquered brass and wooden details, made by Rossi & Arcandi, Vicenza, Italy, designed by Peter Shire for Memphis, USA, 1982. |
| Physical description | Teapot, electroplated nickel silver, lacquered brass and wooden elements supported on three legs. The body a hemi-spherical bowl with a flat circular top from which rises, a flared, straight sided, triangular spout. The top, a cone with a series of regularly spaced incised lines and placed off centre towards the rear. The lid a section of this cone, flanged rim and surmounted by a wooden, spherical ball knop painted bright blue. The teapot is supported at the front by two thin brass rods, lacquered bright red and terminating in a wooden ball foot, painted bright yellow. The legs which are splayed at a slight angle, have a short thread at the top which screw into a small triangular block on the underside of the bowl block. The back leg is black, wooden rod, secured to an angled, tubular socket by a steel screw, the socket soldered to the underside of the lid section, the leg terminating at the base with a triangular, white painted, wooden wedge. |
| Dimensions |
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| Style | |
| Production type | Mass produced |
| Marks and inscriptions | 'MEMPHIS / MILAN' (Stamped on the underside of the lid section) |
| Summary | Since the 1970s, Peter Shire (b. 1947) has been working at an intersection. Where craft, fine art, and industrial design collide, he has built his career, drawing freely from each area without taking any of it too seriously. He has had forays into architecture, furniture, and fashion, but he keeps returning to ceramics. Like his home and studio in the Los Angeles suburb of Echo Park, clay is one medium he knows he will never leave. Shire’s early teapots were also significant because they attracted the eye of Ettore Sottsass, one of the founders of Memphis, an international design movement that came out of Italy during the 1980s. Sottsass found Shire’s teapots “fresh, witty, and full of information for the future”, and the members of Memphis agreed. The group, which sought to revitalize design by rejecting conventional standards in favor of a bold, colourful, novel approach to product design, invited Shire to Milan to work with them. This lead to a series of projects that toyed with the intersections of industrial design and fine art, and gave Shire the opportunity to work in glass, metal and other new mediums. |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | M.36:1 to 2-2010 |
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| Record created | November 11, 2010 |
| Record URL |
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