The Bird is on the Table

Pablo Picasso, Chouette, Vallauris, 1968

Birds were a favorite theme of many Mid-Century decorative artists, especially potters,

and I agree with them that modernist aesthetics and bird forms are a marriage made in heaven. 

Here's an assortment of my own favorites from various pottery studios 

and ceramic factories around Europe.

Chelsea Pottery plate by Joyce Morgan, 1960s, via Mid Mod Mom

Lisa Larson for Gustavsberg

Two Ceramic Vases and a cup by Roger Capron, Vallauris, 1950-1960

 Dish with bird motif and bottle from the Baca range by Nils Thorsson, 

Aluminia Royal Copenhagen, mid-1960s via Retro Pottery Net

Henry Clante, bird vessels, Denmark, via Freeforms and Mid-Centuria

Salt & Pepper shakers by John Clappison for Hornsea, via Mid-Centuria and robmcrorie

Lucite dove by Abraham Palatnik, 1960s, via The Wallpaper Files

Aldo Londi

Plates by Cuno Fisher, 1961, and Marianne Johnson, 1969, via Art of Vintage

 

Oiva Toikka, Iittala glass bird

Tuscan Clay

These modernist Italian ceramics were produced by Aldo Londi at  Bitossi.
The company was founded in 1921 by Guido Bitossi and is still run by his family. 
Its hometown, Montelupo Fiorentino, has been an important center of pottery production
 since the Renaissance. Numerous important and innovative designers have collaborated with Bitossi
 throughout its history, including Piero Fornasetti, Ettore Sottsass, Nathalie du Pasquier
 and Marco Zanini, but Londi was surely the most significant contributor to the company's identity.

Londi was born in Montelupo in 1911, and started working for a ceramics manufacturer
 when he was 11 years old. After being taken prisoner in South Africa during WW2, he returned
 to Italy and in 1946 was appointed artistic director at Bitossi. He held that position for over 50 years,
 and created thousand of designs for vases, jugs, animals, candle stick holders and other objects.

 Londi was a creative experimenter in both form and technique, who combined
great technical skills and traditional knowledge with a contemporary artistic sensitivity
and great curiosity for new sources of ideas and inspiration. His distinctive ceramic designs
 were decorated with a great variety of patterns, glazes and color combinations.

thanks to Mid-Centuria



Londi's most famous series, the Rimini Blu collection, was designed between 1953 and 1965.
 These vibrantly colored ceramics were individually decorated with hand embossed patterns
and painted with layered glazes in various shades of blue with a touch of green and purple.

In 2006 Bitossi started reissuing some Londi designs made between 1950 and 1970.
Miniature Rimini Bianco is a selection of ten figurines from the original Rimini Blu series
reproduced in small size and white color.

The last range designed by Londi was Arkitectura, a collection of elegant and quirky stylized animal figures
decorated with embossed lines and dots and a painted with a monochrome white, black or platinum color glaze.
It's still being produced and you can find it in various design shops around the web.