Welcome to my annual exhibition at Ebiya Bijutsuten in Nihonbashi, Tokyo!
It has been my great pleasure and honour to exhibit here almost every year since 1993, save a few interruptions with natural disasters and stuff. It is very much like coming home.
Ebiya is a dealer in antiquities, and Miyake san, the 9th generation proprietor, is the loveliest person you could ever wish to meet. They've been in business since 1673, originally in Kyoto, but they came to Tokyo with the Meiji Emperor in the 1800s as Purveyors to the Imperial Household.
During my exhibition they put most of the antiques into storage, leaving mainly the furniture, and that is where my pots are displayed.
I have always been conscious of the longevity of my craft. The pots I make are part of a ceramic discourse which has been going on for at least ten-thousand years, and my own works will last long beyond my own life for generations to come. As such, they need to be informed by and aware of that conversation, and add to it a perspective which is unique to my lived experience and relevant to contemporary society, but also translate across time and different cultures.
My pots tell their own story, and their presence is just as calm and self assured in the historical context of Ebiya as it is on the kitchen counter, a restaurant table, or a plinth in a modern gallery. I hope that means that they speak to our shared human experience, our common understanding of ourselves in the natural world, no matter who we are.
I invite you to come and share this moment and the pots which are a testament to my journey thus far.
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