Weathervane Teapot

Problem:

I was browsing the online catalog of the Luce Foundation Center for American Art, looking for inspiration when I stumbled across a bizarre construction I really couldn't understand, Peter Shire's 1981 Weathervane Teapot.

Experiment:

After not seeing anything hinting a teapot or a weather vane in it for a minute or so, I made a 3D model of it so that I might happen upon what Shire might have been thinking when he created it (i.e. going through the process of creating it might help me think whatever Shire was thinking when he created it).

Findings:

1. The yellow torus-thingy on the right reminds me of a teapot handle.
2. The shish-kebab-style skewer of cubes, spheres, and a cylinder is reminiscent of a barbecue, perhaps connoting flames rising from the indentation below which are meant to act like a burner on a gas stove.
3. The radially symmetrical curvy thing in the center-right may be an abstraction or exaggeration of the water-holding, concave-up shape of a normal teapot.
4. The upward-pointing doober sticking out of the aforementioned curvy thingy looks like it might be the spout.
5. The blue triangle and square look like they would spin with air movement, or at least align themselves with the direction of the wind like a weather vane (assuming you only care about measuring whether the wind is blowing up or down).