Loetz vase Jutta Sika PG 358 1901

Jutta Sika was among the most talented students of Koloman Moser at the Vienna School of Arts and Crafts. She was a member of the Wiener Werkstätte and a founding member of the Austrian Werkbund. She became particularly known for her designs for glass and ceramics.
Our vase is a design by Jutta Sika, documented by the paper pattern catalog of the Loetz archive. The same design was also exhibited in a tea room of the Vienna Secession, part of the “Industrial, Commercial and Art Exhibition” at the Kunstpalast in Düsseldorf in 1902. The room was under the artistic direction of Josef Hoffmann and Leopold Bauer. There, the vase, with Moser’s “Stripes and Spots” decor, was prominently displayed on the center table, as shown in historical photographs of the exhibition published in the contemporary journal Innendekoration.
Our vase bears the decor “Phenomen Genre 358,” which is of no less distinction, since it was specially designed by Franz Hofstötter for the 1900 Paris World’s Fair, in which Jutta Sika also participated. Its iridescent surface, with horizontal bands of color progressing from a dark ground through bluish and yellow tones to glowing red, reinforces the impression of a distant horizon beneath a red-lit sky.
Today, Jutta Sika’s designs are held in numerous museums, including the Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.