Buffleheads and Mussels Bottle with Stopper

Tim Christensen

Buffleheads and Mussels Sgrafitto porcelain ceramic bottle with stopper by Tim Christensen Environmental Art Midcoast Maine Artisan Store The Good Supply Pemaquid Made in USA
  • Buffleheads and Mussels Sgrafitto porcelain ceramic bottle with stopper by Tim Christensen Environmental Art Midcoast Maine Artisan Store The Good Supply Pemaquid Made in USA
  • Buffleheads and Mussels Sgrafitto porcelain ceramic bottle with stopper by Tim Christensen Environmental Art Midcoast Maine Artisan Store The Good Supply Pemaquid Made in USA
  • $550.00

When looking out across the water on a Maine Winter day, one may notice dabs of white across the grey green surface. Wave caps? Floating chunks of ice, maybe? Upon closer look - and possibly with the help of some binoculars - they come into focus. Bufflehead ducks have arrived  for the winter from their summer homes up North. Announcing themselves with bright flashes of white plumage on their heads and flanks, small groups bob along tidal rivers and coastlines. Watch as they dive deep to feast on the mussels nestled below.

The scene comes alive on this elegant vessel crowned with a tapered striped stopper. Each surface is considered. From the clusters of mussels layered at the base to the air bubbles that dance the the surface where they meet the flock.

- Measures 7" x 3.5"
- Wood-fired porcelain
- Sgraffito
- Wash by hand

Ceramic artist Tim Christensen divides his time between Portland and Downeast Maine. At his off-grid studio Tim finds inspiration for his porcelain pieces. Schools of herring, flocks of chattering songbirds, and all matter of sea life are skillfully carved on the surfaces of his hand-thrown and constructed forms.

Tim began working in clay in 1999, and he has been etching his black and white pieces since 2004. Using the centuries-old decorative technique of Sgraffito, Tim carves intricate worlds teeming with life and energy. Firing much of his work at Watershed Center for Ceramic Art in Newcastle, Maine, Tim finds that the collaborative Midcoast institution's salt and wood-fire kilns add variety and allow for the possibility of happy accidents, which are common in the ceramic world and offer welcome play on the artist's meticulous carvings.

Tim has shown his work around the world and recently completed his first book. Written with co-author Carri Lange, “Reflect, Adapt, and Persevere” he tells of his travels and thoughts on environmental philosophy.

From the Artist:

My work is about the ever-changing web of relationships that surround us. Individuals make contact to create relationships, relationships collide to create systems. These systems change over time in response to the other systems around them. I envision my world as an infinite collection of active counterparts, individuals symbiotically wriggling and moving and jostling for space and resources.

In this sea of systems, of relationships, I sit and try to untangle it, sit and try to communicate what I see changing, being created, or disappearing into the past.

This is why I work in our most durable medium, porcelain, and in our longest unbroken historical record, pottery. My work, functional in the information I convey, will be understandable to anyone with an eyeball and the ability to think abstractly.

My goal is to make work which still speaks clearly in 10,000 years, and more importantly, to convey the complexity and richness of the world in which I am most fortunate to live.

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