Cake Plate c. 1920s

Editor: Here we have Otto Lindig’s "Cake Plate" from the Harvard Art Museums. It's a simple circular form, but the glazing creates such a nuanced surface. What symbolic weight might a seemingly mundane object like this hold? Curator: Consider the circle, Editor. Universally, it represents wholeness, eternity, and cycles. Does the plate's imperfection, the slight crack, disrupt that symbolism, or perhaps, deepen it? Editor: That's interesting. It makes me think about the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi, finding beauty in imperfection. Curator: Precisely! The crack and the glaze variations become part of its story, embedding memory and use. Does this shift your understanding of its function? Editor: It does. I see it less as a simple plate and more as a vessel of experience. Curator: And that, my friend, is where the ordinary transforms into the extraordinary.