Reuben Nakian and James Burt, Incised White Terracotta Vase Depicting Leda and the Swan (1984)

Description These four vases in our collection are the result of a collaboration between Reuben Nakian, the noted American sculptor, and James Jackson Burt, who was, at the beginning of their artistic partnership, a seventeen year-old aspiring artist.  Can you imagine ... a high school student is on a field trip to the studio of a celebrated sculptor who just happens to live in his hometown of Stamford CT.  His father is a potter and the student has been making classical-shaped vases.  He has an idea and on a whim asks the sculptor if he would draw scenes on his vases.  The famous sculptor agrees, joins him at the boy's family studio and they make their first pot together!  That is the story behind what would become a 14 year-long collaboration, mentorship and friendship between the two artists until Nakian's death in 1986.  We love this story as well as the mythological scenes that Nakian chose to etch into the wet glaze.  This vase depicts Leda and the Swan, the erotic story of Zeus