Jar with Cover c. 1937

Curator: What strikes me immediately about Jessica Price’s "Jar with Cover," likely rendered around 1937, is its grounding earthiness. It reminds me of a harvest, a season of plenty preserved. Editor: I see that, though my immediate thought is of enforced domesticity, almost against one's will. Curator: Interesting! I mean, yes, it is a very practical, quotidian object. Something made to contain. What in that domesticity feels unwilling to you? Editor: The vessel itself. Jars have historically been tools for preservation – pickling, fermenting – often seen as "women’s work.” While this piece celebrates the artistic nature of earthenware, I see an acknowledgement of how this craft became a prescribed gender role. Curator: You know, I can’t argue with you there, as confining expectations for all sorts of artists were extremely pervasive in this era. The colors themselves – these muted greens and browns – have that familiar feel, the comfort of routine… But those cracks! Like jagged veins of gold running through the body of the jar. They disrupt the perfect smoothness, add an element of vulnerability and beautiful imperfection. Editor: Those “cracks,” I think, also speak to time and use, resilience, perhaps even resistance. Think about the legacy of folk art often crafted by marginalized groups. Here, Price offers us both the utility and, possibly, the underlying quiet subversion of a supposedly simple vessel. How ceramics has a unique story that is so often a woman's story. Curator: Absolutely. There is beauty in both strength and in being “cracked”, letting light in where we might feel most fragile. Thank you, I see this jar quite differently now. Editor: Likewise! Thinking about art in relation to social realities certainly illuminates the stories embedded within the art object itself.