SHIVA VASE

by Ettore Sottsass, 1973

Shiva is the charismatic name of the vase that Ettore Sottsass created in 1973 and which has been produced by BD Barcelona ever since. TAGWERC, official partner of BD Barcelona, offers the Shiva vase as a certified original. According to BD Barcelona, Sottsass regularly traveled to Barcelona in the early 1970s for love. It was the time when BD Barcelona had just formed and the paths of the BD founders and Sottsass crossed in the Catalan metropolis. According to the story, the Shiva vase is said to have remained the fruit of his love for a young Catalan woman for the history of design.

Manufacturer Art meets design by BD Barcelona Design.
Material Ceramic | Glazed
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Text by Bianca KILLMANN
The text is protected by copyright.

Shiva Vase

The fact is that Sottsass travelled to India in the 1950s and 1960s and his vase bears the name of the Hindu deity Shiva. Shiva, god of opposites, is often represented not by a pictorial figure, but by a “lingam”, a symbol. The representation in the form of a rounded stone at the top varies and is sometimes distantly reminiscent of a stylized phallus.

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The Shiva vase is one of Sottsass’s first ceramic works, which were followed about ten years later by the Memphis design movement. The pink ceramic vase is glazed. It measures 23 centimeters in height and 17 centimeters in width. The depth of the sculptural vase is seven centimeters. Sottsass in his own words: “I continue to produce small, small, small architectures, such as this ceramic piece, for example, a little like monuments, a little like tombs, a little like the abandoned temples of the gods, a little like the ruins of the ancient and unknown civilization in which something –the say– was known; it is said that they understood the axes, the curves, the intersections, perhaps even the causation of the courses of the cosmic bodies, along which each day slide the private vertices of the atoms that make up our fragile flesh and blood.”

The Shiva vase is straight at the bottom, which gives it excellent stability. As an eye-catcher on a sideboard or shelf or flower vase on table or window sill – the Shiva Vase is guaranteed to delight any design lover who appreciates the benefits of a design classic. The Shiva vase is classically pink. A golden version of the vase was used as a prize and was specially developed for the 10th edition of the Signes Price Awards, an award for design students.

BD Barcelona is one of the world’s unique brands in the field of artistic furnishing design. In contrast to mass production, BD Barcelona relies on handcrafted artifacts, limited editions, design classics and furniture artworks. The Art Edition by BD Barcelona includes man-made art objects – exclusive, unique and of timeless elegance and value. TAGWERC, as the official partner of BD Barcelona, offers the original designs from the Art Edition of BD Barcelona online and offline.

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Material

  • Material
  • Colour
  • Ceramic glazed
  • Pink

Dimension

  • Length
  • Width
  • Height
  • Weight
  • 17.00 cm
  • 7.00 cm
  • 23.00 cm
  • ./.

Besonderheiten

  • Outdoor suitable
  • No

The Shiva vase was designed by
Ettore Sottsass

Ettore Sottsass with a Leica camera
Designer Ettore Sottsass
Ettore Sottsass with welding goggles and smoke on his face
Original Verliebt. Design objects by Ettore Sottsass in the TAGWERC Design STORE.

Ettore Sottsass Jr. is one of the most avant-garde designers of the 1970s and 1980s. He was a member of the studio Alchimias and founder of the Milan Memphis Group. His designs break with conventions, are expressive and colourful. Designs such as Ultrafragola characterize the native Austrian.

Vase Shiva