VASE

On Friday 19 July 2019, I have a very excellent experience in Oxford. I went to Oxford for visit two museum, Ashmolean Museum and Pitt River Museum. There are many historical collections in these two museum.

In the Ashmolean Museum, I saw a impressive artwork that is vase. It have beautiful appearance—colorful, chic and featured. This work was called “Owl” vase , which was done by an English designer, Christopher Dresser. He was a designer and design theorist, now widely known as one of the first and most important, independent designers.   He wrote a series of articles that appeared in the Art Journal in 1857, “Botany as Adapted to the Arts and Art Manufactures”. He caused us to pay attention to the plant aesthetics of the vase. He used the vase as an artifact, blending the opposites – east and west, minerals and vegetables, practical and artistic, wild and civilized.

This work is one of his series of plant art. When I first saw it, it was attracted by his appearance. It looks like a daffodil and it looks very interesting. I think he can silently spread botany from his own work, and he can blend these two relationships very well. He once said that “standardized plant images are the nature depicted in the purest form. Therefore, they are not natural imitations, but the concrete image of the perfect plant spirit.” He is able to show “reasonable” or “adaptation” by plants. This is an idea that he wants to express through his work. Art comes from nature, but it cannot replicate nature. For him, plant morphology must be standardized to be useful to designers. From his work, we can open a new style of design, we can explore different things from natural form and decorative art.