Toshiko Takaezu
Art and Friendship
This work is one of several that comes from the collection of long-time personal friends of Toshiko Takaezu. The collectors started procuring her work in the early 1990s and have amassed a stunning selection that not only exhibits the breadth and depth of Takaezu’s production but also speaks to their connection and friendship. One of the plates reminds them of their first trip to visit the artist at her New Jersey home and studio as it recalls the New York City skyline one sees from the train. Over the years they would spend many hours with Toshiko. She was known for her green thumb and love of cooking; the collectors enjoyed many delicious meals together, they also helped her tend to her vegetable garden, assisted in cleaning her pots as well enjoyed excursions to countless galleries and museums in the tristate area—Toshiko always had something planned to make the most of their time together.
Over the years, the collectors would also spend time with Toshiko during her yearly winter pilgrimage to her native Hawaii, where they also owned a gallery. Toshiko was inspired by Hawaii, incorporating the lush colors—blues, purples, and whites—of the landscape into her works. Toshiko lived in an area of Honolulu known as Punnui and her brother had a home across the street. She used one of his spare rooms to store some of her pieces, which is where the collectors found the Momo Form and Ocean Edge Closed Form. The dramatic glaze of the Ocean Edge Closed Form caught the collectors’ eyes because of its unusual bold coloration. While Toshiko traditionally preferred more subtle tones, the kiln sometimes had other plans. This was a part of the work that, although unpredictable, she truly embraced.
When in Hawaii, the collectors took ceramics classes at the YWCA (Young Women’s Christian Association) in downtown Honolulu where Toshiko had started a ceramics studio in 1948. She remained involved in the studio, hosting occasional fundraising sales to support the endeavor. It was at the YWCA that Toshiko made lot 607, the Closed Form, which exhibits a glazing technique that she called a “trap glaze”, wherein she would experiment with leftover glazes collection them into one container to see what would happen. Quite often, a serendipitous effect was produced, resulting in beautiful, sophisticated pieces such as this example.
The selection offered, comprised of twenty-three lots, is an exceptional cross-section of the forms for which Toshiko Takaezu is best known and they come to the market for the first time since their acquisition directly from the artist.
If you’re just right with the clay, somehow you feel kind of a music and something you really can’t explain, and then you know that piece is good…and this happens very, very seldom.
Toshiko Takaezu
Toshiko Takaezu, distinguished American ceramic artist and teacher, was born in Hawaii in 1922. She is celebrated as a driving force in the development of the modern ceramic art philosophy that seeks to elevate the product of a potter’s craft from utilitarian vessel to fine art.
The sixth of eleven children, Toshiko Takaezu (pronounced Toe-SHEE-ko Taka-YAY-zoo) was the daughter of Japanese immigrants who emigrated from Okinawa to Pekeekeo, Hawaii. Her art training began in the early 1940s with Saturday painting classes at the Honolulu Academy of Arts. During these early years, she worked with commercial ceramic firms producing press mold pieces. It was through this work that she met Claude Horan, founder of the ceramics program at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. At Horan’s encouragement, Takaezu enrolled at the University – the first step in her formal artistic training.
In 1951, Takaezu was accepted to the prestigious Cranbrook Academy of the Arts in Bloomfield Hills, MI. In her third year, she accepted the position of teaching assistant to Finnish ceramic artist Maija Grotell. An excellent teacher with a knack for experimenting with glazes, Grotell had a profound influence on Takaezu’s work and encouraged her to find her own voice as an artist. After graduating, she went abroad in 1955 to explore her Japanese heritage, including the study of the tea ceremony and Zen Buddhism. While there, she studied the techniques and aesthetics of renowned artists Toyo Kaneshige and Yagi Kazuo, among others.
Takaezu’s clay pots evolved from functional vessels to abstract sculptural “forms” (as she called her works). An affinity for painting led the artist to create her first “closed form” works, as these vessels provided a larger surface on which to apply glaze. This became her signature: vessels with nearly closed-off tops, just open enough to allow gasses to escape during the firing process. Takaezu also began to add “rattles” to her pieces while they were still wet on the wheel before enclosing them completely. She would wrap each in a bit of newspaper first, which she thought of as “sending a message” to the inner space of the piece as she dropped it in. After the piece was fired, and one picked it up, it was Takaezu’s intention to give the handler an unexpected sensory experience.
Throughout her career, Takaezu continued to experiment. She threw squat ball-shaped vessels that she called “moon pots”; vertical forms, and ceramic “tree trunks”. In many of her later works, the artist closed the top of her vessels, removing the vent from view by placing it at the bottom of the form. Takaezu also experimented with the application of glazes, brushing free-hand and creating layers by employing a drip or spray method while she moved around the piece, producing painterly, abstract and serendipitous results. Further, she embraced the element of chance in the firing and believed her kiln was an important influence in the creation of the work, with a will or mind of its own that she couldn’t control and even liked to be surprised by.
Takaezu was a renowned teacher who worked in academia throughout her life, at Cranbrook Academy in Michigan, the University of Wisconsin, the Cleveland Institute of Art, and Princeton University, where she taught until her retirement in 1992. She approached art as she approached life, with a reverence for the natural world. For her, the practice of creating clay vessels was closely tied to everyday life: “In my life I see no difference between making pots, cooking, and growing vegetables,” Takaezu once said, “They are all so related… I get so much joy from working in clay, and it gives me many answers in my life.”
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