The term 'jar' refers to any man-made shape with the capacity to enclose
something. Few objects are as universal and multi-functional as a jar -
regardless of whether they contain food or drink, matter or a void,
life-giving medicine or the ashes of the deceased. As ubiquitous as they
may seem, such containers, storage vessels and urns are, as this book
demonstrates, highly significant cultural and historical artefacts that
mediate between content and environment, exterior worlds and interior
enclosures, local and global, this-worldly and otherworldly realms.
The contributors to this volume understand jars not only as household
utensils or evidence of human civilizations, but also as artefacts in
their own right. Asian jars are culturally and aesthetically defined
crafted goods and as objects charged with spiritual meanings and ritual
significance. Transformative Jars situates Asian jars in a global
context and focuses on relationships between the filling, emptying and
re-filling of jars with a variety of contents and meanings through time
and throughout space.
Transformative Jars brings together an interdisciplinary team of
scholars with backgrounds in curating, art history and anthropology to
offer perspectives that go beyond archaeological approaches with
detailed analyses of a broad range of objects. By looking at jars as
things in the hands of makers, users and collectors, this book presents
these objects as agents of change in cultures of craftsmanship and
consumption.
