Image: Dallas Museum of Art
The exhibition showcases 36 contemporary Japanese women ceramic artists and is organized by the Art Institute of Chicago and the Carol and Jeffrey Horvitz Collection.
It highlights innovative, technically ambitious sculptures created since the 1970s by both established and emerging artists. The works explore human anatomy, flora, geology and abstract forms through approaches to scale, color and surface.
The exhibition frames the artists as rejecting gendered expectations by working across subjects traditionally labeled feminine and masculine in unconventional ways. Each artist produces sculpture that pushes the physical limits of the medium.
Tanaka Yū’s ‘Fukuromono (Bag Work)’ (2018) is glazed Shigaraki stoneware. Shingū Sayaka’s ‘Erosion No. 4 Shokka (Eroding Flower)’ (2021) is made from glazed and unglazed stoneware. Matsuda Yuriko’s ‘In Her Shoes’ (2007) is made from enameled and glazed porcelain. Mishima Kimiyo’s ‘Untitled (Crushed Asahi Beer Box)’ (2007) is glazed and silkscreened stoneware.
Together, the works reveal an overlooked history of creative excellence while expanding understanding of contemporary Japanese ceramics today.
