Philip Johnson Reliquary Urn. 1998.

I am interested in some of the architectural work of American post-modern architect Philip Johnson and I thought that it would be interesting to make an urn about him based upon my own thoughts about him. This was the third urn that I made in the third year of the BA (Hons) Ceramics Degree course.

​The urn is based upon the Chippendale topped AT&T Building, a New York skyscraper of 1984, designed by Johnson working in collaboration with American architect John Burgee. Incorporated into the urn at the top, is one of Johnson’s favourite New York buildings, the Beaux-Arts design Grand Central Terminal of 1913, the railway station in Manhattan, which here I have represented by six arches. The 1940’s-50’s American style diesel railway locomotive would have been a new feature on American railways marking a transition away from the steam locomotive and also is a metaphor for Johnson’s coming of age as an architect at that time in the USA. The three parts to the wings on each side is a reference to the makeup of spirit, soul and body and is also a link to graveyard memorials. His homosexuality is shown by two penises kissing or touching. An indication of death are the blackened windscreens of the diesel railway locomotive and also the upside down lipsticks. The lipsticks are a reference to the 1986 Lipstick Building skyscraper in New York, designed by Johnson working in collaboration with John Burgee. “People think of me as a chameleon”, he has said, hence the chameleon wearing glasses which forms the lid of the urn. Inside the urn is a small inner container covered with gold leaf which echoes the outside and inside this is a picture of a Nazi swastika, a reference to the fact that in his youth Johnson sympathised with the Nazi’s. The urn sits upon a gravestone shaped plinth which has three steps, a reference to the notion of there being three steps to heaven. 

​The dark clay body of the urn is made up from three different clays, Chocolate Black, Red Valentine and White Saint Thomas. The variegated un-glazed surface effects are derived from various gravestones and mausoleums. Beeswax polish has been applied to subtly enhance the surface qualities.