AMSTERDAM.- On November 15th, the monograph Jan van der Vaart. Master potter will be published at the initiative of Cometa* – Stichting voor kunstboekpublicaties. This is the first major publication about the most important post-war Dutch ceramicist since 1991, exactly 25 years after his death. The publication coincides with the opening of a major retrospective about Jan van der Vaart at the Kunstmuseum Den Haag (The Hague).

The most important ceramicist of his generation

Making pots is donkey work, not a genteel undertaking in which your hands are guided by God. It was with this mentality that Jan van der Vaart (1931-2000) created a magnificent body of vases and other everyday objects. He had no cause to complain in his lifetime about a lack of acknowledgement of his remarkable craftsmanship. In his fifty years as a potter, his artistry was warmly embraced by critics, collectors, museums and the state. Early in his career he was recognised as the most important Dutch ceramicist of his generation, a status emphasised by an endless succession of exhibitions, commissions and prizes.

Comprehensive oeuvre

With a visual language of geometric shapes and a small well-chosen palette of lustrous glazes, Van der Vaart made thousands of vases and other vessels. Iconic designs with a timeless, sensual beauty. To make his vases, tulip towers and candlesticks accessible to a broader public, he produced them as multiples, a choice that brought disdain from fellow ceramicists and collectors. His innovative and unconventional approach remains highly relevant today not least because, although self-taught himself, Van der Vaart trained more than a hundred ceramicists over more than two decades at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam.

No pretensions

Jan van der Vaart was a ceramicist without pretensions. He was never caught expressing lofty theories about his own work. He listed his profession simply as "Potter" in his passport. In an interview, he once said, "I'm that little guy who makes flower vases." Flowers were also displayed in his vases at exhibitions. As a lecturer at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy, it has been said that he even scolded students who had their business cards printed with "ceramic artist" on them. Van der Vaart was a potter, a master potter.

Life and work in context

This monography is the product of a vast collaboration. A number of authors described and reflected on Van Der Vaart’s life and work from their own personal perspective. In his assessment of Van der Vaart’s career, Jan de Bruijn, curator of modern applied arts and design at the Kunstmuseum Den Haag, reveals the down-to-earth attitude of the man who resolutely called himself a ‘potter’ and who always rejected artistic pretensions. Art critic Garth Clark, Van der Vaart’s American dealer and founder of the ceramics website cfileonline.org, recalls his working relationship and friendship with him. Journalist Edo Dijksterhuis writes about Van der Vaart’s controversial decision to produce his pots in large editions, his so-called ‘multiples’. The book also includes an article over Van de Vaart as teacher on the Gerrit Rietveld Academy, and a biographical description of an array of unknown facts about his life and work, both by former NRC art editor Arjen Ribbens. And Petra and Erik Hesmerg have photographed Van der Vaart’s ceramics in unparalleled fashion, both in a studio setting and in the homes of collectors.

The publication was made possible by the generous support of the VandenEnde Foundation, Stichting Van Achterbergh-Domhof, the Jaap Harten Fonds, the Cultuurfonds (thanks in part to the Buchter-De Vries Fund) and the Ottema-Kingma Stichting. We are also grafeful for the financial contribution of Gifted Art, Keramiekstichting Smeele Van der Meulen, FB Oranjewoud, Zabawas, P.W. Janssen’s Friesche Stichting and the Abe Bonnema Stichting.

This book was published to coincide with the exhibition Jan van der Vaart: For Jan and All at the Kunstmuseum Den Haag in The Hague from 15 November 2025 to 5 July 2026, the first important survey of his work since his retrospective at Museum Boymans-van Beuningen in 1991. Concurrently, the Princessehof Ceramics Museum in Leeuwarden is hosting a digital exhibition about Van der Vaart on its website. His studio is now part of the museum’s permanent displays.