Icelandic pottery

I have been a fan of Icelandic pottery for a long time, ever since I was given my first piece as a child. Unlike asian pottery, with its clean lines and beautiful glazes, or even southwestern pottery, with its bold symmetric designs, Icelandic pottery delights in its roughness. The movement started in the 60s with the inclusion of hraun (lava rocks) into the glaze, or embedded into the form. More modern pieces are less apt to use rough hewn hraun, but they still maintain the rough aesthetic by leaving portions unglazed, and by using a corse tempering material.

My mother gave me a set of Icelandic pottery for my 30th birthday, and although it was beautiful and heavy and thick, I could tell as soon as I picked it up that it was also friable and therefore fragile. One piece broke the day after I got it, but I repaired it. The other piece started to show some cracks in the glazing (glazing some surfaces and not others adds to the likelihood of this happening). But I kept it around. Then Palmer started playing with it, and it quickly broke. I have not repaired it, nor have I thrown it out. The three broken pieces rest on my shelf, awaiting a rebirth. And that seems apt these days, here in Iceland.