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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Racine, WI    March 16, 2015

Artwork from Racine Art Museum's Teapot Collection Now on View at the Dane County Regional Airport 

 

Martin and Judy Bibby

Bellhop Teapot, ca.1985

Whiteware with glazes and lustres

Racine Art Museum, The Donna Moog Teapot Collection

Photography: Michael Tropea, Chicago
 

A stunning exhibition of contemporary artist-made teapots from the Racine Art Museum (RAM) is open at the Art Court in the Dane County Regional Airport, now through September 3, 2015. Curated by RAM Curator of Exhibitions, Lena Vigna, Time for Tea: Contemporary Ceramic Teapots from Racine Art Museum's Collection showcases 40 teapots that are shining examples of a modern take on tradition. They reflect a general interest in analyzing the past and a specific interest in exploring the idea of form and function.

 

In 1999, collector Donna Moog offered RAM a gift of over 250 teapots. The impact of the Moog collection cannot be understated as it offered a large body of work with diverse artists and styles represented. Since this gift, RAM has added over 100 teapots from various other donors including Dale and Doug Anderson, Karen Johnson Boyd, Gail M. and Robert A. Brown, David and Jacqueline Charak, and Iris and Jay Leonard with the Kohler Foundation, thereby establishing one of the largest public collections of contemporary artist-made teapots in the United States.

 

Interested in the past but also looking to investigate and innovate, contemporary artists sometimes use the teapot form because it is both easily understood and ripe for experimentation. By drawing on a familiar type of object, artists can connect with others fairly easily-even if they ultimately upend expectations or specific notions about how a teapot should look or what it does.


More About the Racine Art Museum
Racine Art Museum (RAM), with the largest contemporary crafts collection in the United States, owns artworks made of ceramic, fiber, glass, metal, polymer, and wood. Established in 2003, as an extension of the Charles A. Wustum Museum of Fine Arts--also in Racine--RAM produces between 15 and 20 exhibitions annually. These shows, featuring a combination of works borrowed from across the country and drawn from RAM's own collection, reveal the museum's interest in art as a creative act, with craft media shown alongside drawings, prints, watercolors, photographs, and sculptures.

 

This exhibition is made possible in part by RAM Platinum Sponsors: Karen Johnson Boyd and William B. Boyd, SC Johnson, and Windgate Charitable Foundation.


Tandem Press coordinates the exhibits at the Dane County Regional Airport. Tandem Press, a self supporting entity, is affiliated to the Department of Art in the School of Education at the UW-Madison. It shares the University mission by teaching, undertaking research into new and old printmaking techniques, and by conducting outreach programs to help educate the public about art in general, and printmaking in particular.

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Together, the two campuses of the Racine Art Museum, RAM in downtown Racine at 441 Main Street and the Charles A. Wustum Museum of Fine Arts at 2519 Northwestern Avenue, seek to elevate the stature of contemporary crafts to that of fine art by exhibiting significant works in craft media with painting, sculpture and photography, while providing outstanding educational art programming.

Docent led contemporary craft and architectural tours of the museums are available. Both campuses of the Racine Art Museum, are open to the public Tuesday - Saturday 10:00 am - 5:00 pm, and are closed Mondays, Federal holidays and Easter. RAM is open Sunday Noon - 5:00 pm, while Wustum is closed Sundays. An admission fee of $5 for adults, with reduced fees for students and seniors, applies at RAM. Admission to Wustum is free. Members are always admitted without charge to either campus.

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