Jan Bontjes van Beek (born 18 January 1899 in Vejle, Denmark; † 5 September 1969 in Berlin) was a German ceramicist, sculptor and dancer.

After several stays abroad to study in Paris, Prague, Bontjes van Beek worked in 1932, initially on an order from the architect Fritz Höger in Velten near Berlin, to produce ceramics for the new church on Hohenzollernplatz in Wilmersdorf.

[5] Under the German tradition, where family members were deemed to share responsibility for the crime, known as Sippenhaft, Jan Bontjes van Beek was also arrested.

[4] On 18 January 1943, Cato was found guilty at the Reichskriegsgericht (military court) of abetting a conspiracy to commit high treason and sentenced to death.

[7] Bontjes van Beek was released after three months in prison for lack of evidence,[3] but conscripted into the Wehrmacht in 1944 and deployed as a soldier on the Eastern Front.

[3] After surviving the Second World War, Bontjes van Beek started an academic career initially as a lecturer in ceramics at the Berlin University of the Arts.