Vase

Finnish-born Maija Grotell was a pioneering figure in elevating work in clay as fine art. In 1938 Grotell was hired to teach ceramics at the Cranbrook Academy of Art, where she built an artistic practice throwing forms on a potter’s wheel that she then imaginatively decorated using layers of slip and glaze. “I always have something I am aiming at,” said Grotell, “and I keep on . . . I do not sketch on paper, I sketch in clay.” This luminous, tactile vessel shows the range of textural effects that she achieved in her work.