Slipcast porcelain, wild glazes, foraged materials, pine wood tray

Urn for the sea is a porcelain urn created with wild clay, granite, sand and ashes from the shores of the Baltic Sea. Through interacting with, learning about, and talking to the Baltic Sea, the designers discovered a sense of helplessness about the perilous state of the sea. The material exploration with firing and glaze development became a way of processing the grief for the struggling sea. Out of this process grew the idea of creating a ceramic urn, covered with glazes made from foraged materials — a symbolic vessel of mourning for the sea itself.

A hundred years from now, due to the climate change and human industrialization impact, the Baltic Sea has eventually passed away. For the consequences, under the dead Baltic Sea, the evidence of its existence remained as soil, rocks, shells and dead algae. Today is the funeral. We collected the traces of the Baltic Sea to build a memorial in loving memory of what the Baltic Sea had given to us. We present its past residence making the urn as a monument. The funeral is very quiet. Because all the living creatures had already left. There is no sound of birds or scattering water. The nearest trees have fallen and the other trees are starting to become languished. Therefore, without any obstacles, only scratching wind is blowing through our cheeks accusingly. Now we realize that we are not only the problem nor the solution, but we were just a part of the Baltic Sea.