Earth to Earth: Potted Immortality

For thousands of years the potter's art has linked life and death.

Vessels which contained nourishment for the living like wine or grain, were transformed into urns, destined for the afterlife, becoming receptacles for the deceased, for their cremated ashes, for their collected bones, and for their vital organs.

For those of us left temporarily above ground, we are surrounded by urns in earthenware, porcelain and other clays.

Today artists like Turner Prize winner Grayson Perry, who has also made funeral urns, now uses ceramics to tell a tale of death with works like "We Have Found the Body of Your Child." Other artists now create unique urns that contain the remains within the clay or glaze, producing dramatic effects and preserving the deceased forever.

Ceramicist Lars Tharp takes us on a personal journey looking back and forward with Grayson Perry and using readings from Sir Thomas Browne's treatise "Urn Burial."

Lars also talks to funeral directors, ceramic experts and visits the British Museum where we will uncover the urn which inspired Keats to write his poem "Ode on a Grecian Urn.

Producer: Neil George

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in August 2009.