Ceramics has always been a medium of touch, weight, and material truth. Clay becomes porcelain, glaze announces texture, and the object in your hand is usually exactly what it appears to be: a cup, a bowl, a plate, all proudly inhabiting their physical form. Yet some of the most interesting work in contemporary ceramics is doing the opposite. A new wave of designers and artists is using porcelain, paper, lacquer, and optical sleight of hand to make ceramic objects look strangely unceramic, or at least unlike what our eyes expect them to be.