Blue Nocturne Chalice

The husband and wife team of Otto and Gertrud Natzler combined Gertrud's elegant forms and Otto's glaze formulations to create intimately scaled vessels enhanced with rich colors and textures. Otto describes their work: "We focused our interest on exploring form in its totality-searching for perfection of outline and proportion-and relating to its color and texture of the surface." Their continual experimentation with materials and methods led to these wafer-thin vessels that glow from both vibrantly and subtly hued glazes. The Museum has benefitted enormously from generous Kansas City collectors of the Natzlers' work, including John R. and Mary Louise Womer and the Jedel Family Foundation.