Skip Ribbon Commands
Skip to main content
Seattle Art Museum (SAM)
menu
Skip Navigation Linksvisit

Baked Potato

Photo: Elizabeth Mann

Baked Potato

1966

Claes Oldenburg

American, 1929 - 2022

An Offering: Vessels and Votives in Contemporary Ceramics

Shaping humble clay into transcendent forms fit for the divine is a tradition as old as ceramics themselves. Drawing inspiration from the ancient vernacular of forms and techniques, contemporary artists work with clay to create sculpture that, to our eyes, is both instinctively familiar and unexpectedly fresh.

Realistically painted or sculpted food was an indispensible part of both Sumerian and Egyptian beliefs and rituals. The image of food or other offerings would nourish gods or the deceased in perpetuity. Claes Oldenburg’s Baked Potato revisits this custom centuries later.
Cast resin, painted with acrylic, Shenango china dish
4 1/2 x 10 1/2 x 7 in. (11.43 x 26.67 x 17.78 cm)
Gift of Sidney and Anne Gerber
86.274.4
Photo: Elizabeth Mann
location
Not currently on view

Resources

Exhibition HistorySeattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Collection Highlights: 1945 To The Present, Sept. 12, 1996 - June 1, 1997.

Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Pop Departures, Oct. 9, 2014 - Jan. 11, 2015. Text by Catharina Manchanda, et al. No cat. no., p. 102, reproduced p. 48.

Seattle Art Museum respectfully acknowledges that we are on Indigenous land, the traditional territories of the Coast Salish people. We honor our ongoing connection to these communities past, present, and future.

Learn more about Equity at SAM