Tea Party

Eye-popping works at ASU’s Ceramics Research Center

Comments (0) By Wynter Holden Thursday, Dec 10 2009

In case you didn’t know, the world’s priciest coffee is Kopi Luwak. What makes it so special? Well, the beans are ingested, partially dissolved, and crapped out by a fuzzy Indonesian animal. Thanks, but we'll stick to tea, where there's no excretion involved. Ever. Besides, custom teapots can be works of art, while coffeemakers are pretty much all the same.

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See more than fifty handcrafted ceramic vessels in the “Strange Brew: The Gerald and Daphna Cramer Teapot Collection” exhibit. Some of the works are sleek and functional. Others are wacky, like John Defazio's Brooke Shields teapot, which features a giant yellow smiley face, a miniature crown, and Brooke’s trademark Yeti eyebrows.

Can a teapot really be considered art? "The teapot form, used for centuries for brewing tea, is one of the most familiar household objects," says exhibit curator Peter Held. "They are challenging to construct: the spout, handle, body, and lid must all be integrated into a unified whole."

Tuesdays-Saturdays. Starts: Dec. 15. Continues through Feb. 19, 2009