Pair of Handmade Provençal Ceramic Plates with Cicada Motif

From the kitchen shelves of Chanteduc, Patricia and Walter Wells's farmhouse in Vaison-la-Romaine. Both are glazed in a warm, honeyed ocher — the colour of Provençal stone in afternoon light — and both are unmistakably hand-formed. One is octagonal, its eight faceted edges giving it a crisp, almost architectural character; the other is round and gently irregular, and comes from Apt, a town in the Luberon long celebrated for its faïence tradition. In Provence, the cicada is the region's most beloved emblem — a symbol of summer, of the long dry heat, of the south itself. Its song fills the garrigue from June onwards, and it appears on ceramics, linens and doorways not as kitsch but as a genuine mark of place. Together or separately, they sit beautifully on a kitchen dresser or breakfast table, or grouped with other Provençal ceramics as a small, considered collection. Note: One plate has a crack