Richard Notkin's "Cooling Towers Teapots" employs thesimplicity and wit of the Yixing teapot, with its absence of glaze;at the same time, the teapot reflects Notkin's opposition to nuclearpower and his pacifism. The way in which Chinese ceramists carvedobjects from daily life on their teapots seems to have influencedNotkin. The different types of nuts carved with such precision onthe base of the teapot represent the political maneuverings of abunch of crazed politicians, while the construction of nuclear powerplants (the two cooling towers) and deployment of nuclear missiles,with their ability to cause massive destruction, are compared togambling (the two dice) , playing with people's lives; Death iswaiting under a mushroom cloud (the lid) . What is going to pourout from the pile of waste containers at the spout of the teapot?