Photo: TMP
Photo: TMP
Photo: TMP
Photo: TMP

Water Tray

USA, 1978
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Date acquired:
Materials:
White Earthenware
Form - Functional: N/A
Form - Sculptural: N/A
Method:
Hand-Built
Surface Technique: N/A
Kiln Type: N/A
Glazes:
Glaze
Betty Woodman

Betty Woodman began her career in the 1950s as a production potter. Later, as a studio potter Woodman worked with many domestic forms including baskets, dinnerware, pillow forms, pitchers, and vases. Sheis known for her sculptures which are anchored by a vessel form: either one that pours or contains.Woodman's pieces are typically made using white earthenware clay.

Her work is often influenced by her memories of paintings, landscapes or architecture seen in her travels. Throughout her career, Woodman returned to the vase form, repeatedly deconstructing and reconstructing this form in her sculptures. The vase connects her work to art historical still life vase motifs and is the form that anchors her work in the vessel based realm of clay. Gradually her pieces became sculptural forms with colorful painterly surfaces. Often she made compositions of two or more objects that grew from the deconstruction of similar pieces, their parts interchanged with abstracted new sculptural objects. A hallmark of Woodman?s work in various media is her love, understanding and inventive use of color.

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Woodman in other collections

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These records have been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced.

Last updated: April 22, 2026

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