Lidded jar

Danish ceramicist, Inger Rokkjaer, describes her work as a ‘cultural encounter’. [1] It combines the simplicity of Scandinavian modernist design with raku ware, a type of ceramic earthenware that originated in Japan in the 16th century, traditionally used to make tea bowls for the auspicious Japanese tea ceremony.

This cylindrical jar is minimal with strong form and subtle details. The vessel emits a warm glow from a blush of pink-orange glaze over its ribbed centre. The delicate crazing marks on the surface of the glaze are a distinct characteristic of raku ware and a result of the rapid heating and cooling process of raku firing. Rokkjaer continually returns to the lidded vessel (see 50770) and although a utilitarian object, with her poised form and use of colour she instils it with reverence.

Rokkjaer acknowledges the influence of Japanese ceramics on her practice. However, she aims to create work that is in dialogue with the ceramic traditions of her home, the Jutland Peninsula in Denmark, where in the mid-1800s over a million pots per year were made predominantly by women from Jutland earthenware. [2]

She is also fascinated by the stories of everyday ceramic objects from the area, which in the 19th century included confinement pots: ceramic vessels filled with food gifted to nourish new mothers. Rokkjaer’s work echoes these ceramic histories. Her vessels are made mostly from local clay that she has dug herself and her everyday domestic forms serve to nurture daily life.

Sim Panaser, June 2020

[1] Inge Rokkjaer, ‘Two Danish Potters’, Ceramic Review, No. 139 (January/February 1993), 21, (p. 21).

[2] Robert Anderson and Edna Mitchell, From Folk Art to Modern Design in Ceramics: Ethnographic Adventures in Denmark and Mexico 1975-1978 updated 2010 (Bloomington: iUniverse, 2011), p. 215.