February 10, 2007

Gallery Presentations: NEW YORK 2007

Akiyama Yô Untitled T-066, 2006 33 H x 46 W x 31 D cm Photo: Seiji Toyonaga Joan B. Mirviss, Ltd., New York

Joan B. Mirviss, Ltd., New York, a specialist in Asian decorative and fine arts, will present the evocative sculptural clay art of Japanese artist Akiyama Yô, in his first solo exhibition in America. "Critics repeatedly state that Akiyama is one of the most exciting Japanese artists today-not a ceramist but rather a sculptor whose medium is clay. He does not merely confront tradition but rather seeks to expose the very nature of clay," says Mirviss.

Yô's works are in many public collections including National Museum of Art, Osaka, National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, and Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England.

	George Nakashima Slab Coffee Table, 1962 American Black Walnut Moderne Gallery, Philadelphia

Among the mid-century modern work presented by Moderne Gallery, Philadelphia is a 1962 Slab Coffee Table by artist/designer George Nakashima (1905-1990). Gallery Director/Owner Robert Aibel describes the piece as a "dramatic, American black walnut, single board, free-form coffee table with rosewood butterflies. Large boards from the crotch of a tree such as this one are quite rare."

Aibel was recently quoted in The New York Times and Financial Times as an expert on Nakashima.

February 22, 2007

	Xiang Yang Relationship: Red Desire Steel, silk screening, thread 20 h x 24 w x 72" d Snyderman Works Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

Snyderman Works Gallery, Philadelphia presents Chinese fiber/mixed-media artist, Xiang Yang, who uses thread and various encasements to explore the concept of two - versus three dimensional space, calling to mind the Buddhist concept of samara-- ever- transfiguring being. Yang says, "When I cast my eyes on the surface, while moving the needle in my hand through the depth of another space, I anxiously await a transformation. As the threads move from the surface of the object into inner space, the two-dimensional alignment (changes) into a three-dimensional one, taking on an architectural form."

Yang encases colorful, embroidered images such as Buddha, George Bush, Saddam Hussein and Chairman Mao inside a metal box frame that elongates the thread stitches up to 4 feet in length. Tranquil Eastern perspectival space and rushing, almost cartoon-like Western time are at once experienced by the viewer.

Fernando Casasempere Venice Landscape, 2006 Porcelain and stoneware coloured with industrial waste on steel jacks. 43 h x 120 w x 150" d Photo: Studio Caparrrelli, London Joanna Bird Pottery, London, England

Joanna Bird Pottery, London presents ceramic/mixed-media artist Fernando Casasempere, who was born in Santiago, Chile, and currently resides in London. Casasempere was recently commissioned by the prestigious Jerwood Sculpture Park in England to create a large-scale sculpture using industrial waste from the copper industry.

Joanna Bird says, "Casasempere works on an epic scale, creating sculptures that are intentionally hidden in meaning, drawing the viewer into a more reflective space. They have a timeless quality which comes in part from his use of materials, mixing clay with recycled materials from manufacturing processes. The result is at once earthy and organic, yet otherworldly. His most recent sculptures come out of a project with the Henry Moore Foundation. In their sense of presence, and sheer scale, they are his most adventurous pieces to date and are mesmerizing." Casasempere will speak in the SOFA NEW YORK 2007 Lecture Series.

March 8, 2007

	Iris Eichenberg Chatelaine "Timelines/Tenements" Series, 2007 Wood, copper, leather, 5 x 2 x 1.75" Photo: Francis Willemstijn Ornamentum, Hudson, NY

Are the fusion creations of Amsterdam-based German artist Iris Eichenberg jewelry, art or design? Her finely crafted, sensual jewelry, miniature sculptures and installation work criss-cross definitions between disciplines, rendering these boundaries useless. Represented at SOFA NEW YORK 2007 by Ornamentum, Hudson, NY, Eichenberg is currently Head of the Jewelry Department at Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. This fall, she will take up her new position as Artist in Residence/Head of the Metal/Jewelry Department at Cranbrook Academy of Art.

Eichenberg has won numerous prestigious international awards, such as the Gerrit Rietveld Academy Award, the Artist Stimulation Award, and the Herbert Hoffman Award. Her most recent series of works, inspired by the material remnants of Western and Eastern European immigration to the New World, centers on experiences of loss and belonging, dislocation and resettlement, consistencies and transformations in taste. Eichenberg will speak in the SOFA NEW YORK 2007 Lecture Series.

Jon Eric Riis Bomber Jacket Woven metallic and silk thread, 32 x 69" Jane Sauer THIRTEEN MOONS Gallery, Santa Fe, NM

Jane Sauer THIRTEEN MOONS Gallery, Santa Fe, NM will represent celebrated tapestry weaver, Jon Eric Riis, renowned for his probing contemporary subject matter—often political and risqué, expert draftsmanship, and creative surface embellishment. One of his tapestries is currently on display at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art in One of a Kind:The Studio Craft Movement, on view through Sept. 5. Read more on One of a Kind In addition to the MET, his works are in the public collections of The Art Institute of Chicago, The Renwick Art Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Museum of Arts & Design, among others.

Jane Sauer said, "For many years Jon researched historical textiles and related objects which became the inspiration for much of his work. His realistic subject matter seems almost alive on the picture plane because of his masterful ability to depict intricate details in his tapestries. He employs subtle gradations of color to illustrate form and shading, and often embellishes the surface with gold threads, seed pearls, crystal beads, leather and/or coral."

March 26, 2007

	Hiroshi Suzuki M-Fire VI, 2006 Hammer-raised fine silver 999 12.25 x 9 x 9 Clare Beck at Adrian Sassoon, London

Clare Beck at Adrian Sassoon, London will present contemporary works by UK artists, including metalwork by two Japanese artists based in London- silversmith Hiroshi Suzuki, whose sculptural silver vessels are inspired by "elements of nature: fire, water, wind." Suzuki says, "I often feel as if I am playing with clay, pushing and pulling metal into form; just that I use hammers instead of fingertips." Also represented by Clare Beck is abstract jeweler/sculptor Junko Mori, who was shortlisted for Great Britain's prestigious Jerwood Prize in 2005. Mori says, "I am always drawn to the visual impact of an aggregate... uncontrollable beauty is the core of my concept."

Takashi Hinoda Time Goes By, 2004 Ceramic, 12 x 6.3 x 8.3 Sold at SOFA NEW YORK 2006 by Dai Ichi Arts, New York, NY

Dai Ichi Arts, New York returns to SOFA NEW YORK with fanciful ceramic sculptures by Takashi Hinoda that reference Japanese popular culture such as Anime, manga and the Japanese passion for Kawaii (cute) characters. "Avoiding the wetness of Japanese ceramics" has always been one of Hinoda's artistic goals. He sprays a color slip on the ceramic body after it is dried and trimmed. According to the artist, ultra-contemporary even in process, "(It's) not really glazing in the old sense. It is more like painting a house's outer walls, a plastic model, or a car." Dai Ichi sold 4 Hinoda sculptures at SOFA NEW YORK 2006, one to the Mint Museum of Craft + Design.

March 28, 2007

	Jun Kaneko Untitled Dango #05-10-08, 2005 Glazed ceramic, 30.25 x 20 x 12.5 " Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO

New Exhibitor! Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO will represent Jun Kaneko, world-renowned for his bronze and graphically glazed ceramic sculptures including large-scale heads and pillow-like Dangos (which means "dumpling" in Japanese). Kaneko studied with Peter Voulkos, Paul Soldner, and Jerry Rothman in California during the contemporary ceramics movement, and has taught at many universities including RISD and Cranbrook Academy. He was recently the subject of a major feature article in The New York Times by art critic Michael Kimmelman, who quoted Kaneko on the subject of his gigantic Dangos: "Big pieces you have to look up at. It's the difference between looking at a flower or up at a tall tree or at a mountain.I like things you have to look up to." Kaneko's work is included in more than forty museum collections and he has realized over twenty-five public art commissions around the world. Read New York Times article on Kaneko>

Michael Lucero Baby Carriage, 1994 Ceramic with glazes, metal 32 x 22 x 14" Photo: Goodbody Donna Schneier Fine Arts, New York, NY

Donna Schneier Fine Arts, New York will present both new works by Michael Lucero and stellar pieces from over two decades of the artist's glazed ceramic and mixed media sculptures, including such series as the Shard Figures, Dreamers, Pre-Columbus, New World, and Reclamation. Lucero's figurative forms borrow with panache from a variety of cultures and art histories including pre-Columbian and Native American; the European avant-garde; African-based forms; and George Ohr ceramics, as well as the vernacular and mass media. Lucero has always challenged the so-called limitations of clay: "I don't have to weld or chisel wood or carve stone to be able to make sculpture.there were all these wonderful alternatives.. [Using clay I could] make something that was [as] justified or legitimate as anyone else..yet have my own identify felt through the work."-Excerpted from Carnegie Museum Online in conjunction with Carnegie Museum of Art's retrospective exhibition, Michael Lucero: Sculpture 1976-1995.

April 10, 2007

	Philip Eglin Peekaboo Madonna and Child, 2006 Porcelain, 17 x 6 x 5 DEAN PROJECT, Long Island City, NY

DEAN PROJECT, Long Island City, NY presents UK ceramist Philip Eglin’s porcelain Madonnas, inspired by northern medieval woodcarvings. Eglin, renowned for bridging tradition and mass communication/ consumption, has observed with sensitivity the historical woodcarvings’ aesthetic qualities but equally understood their nature as “artifacts,” recognizing their damage as vital components fo their form. “The loss of the Virgin's nose, the reduction of the Infant Christ to a mere stump - such features, when assimilated into Eglin's own works, seem to lend them a history of their own and to increase their feeling of timelessness.” —Alun Graves. Eglin won the UK’s prestigious Jerwood Prize for Applied Arts: Ceramics in 1996.

Bonnie Seeman Untitled Teapot, 2006 Porcelain, glass, 9 x 6 x 6 Duane Reed Gallery, St. Louis, MO

Duane Reed Gallery, St. Louis presents the arresting ceramics of Bonnie Seeman, new to SOFA, whose work in included in the MET’s current exhibiton, One of a Kind: The Studio Craft Movement, on view from through September 3. Seeman’s functional forms evoke the naturalistic vegetable forms of mid-18thc. British ceramic manufacturers, but play on contemporary themes of attraction and repulsion. Seeman says, “My vessels often contain both beautiful and disturbing elements. Because my work is meant to show beauty within the ill, both of these qualities are important. Soft plant and flower forms are often juxtaposed with raw anatomy.” Duane Reed reports that Seeman “sold out her work at the past 2 Art Basel's and won the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation 2005 Biennial Award. Glenn Lowry, the director of Museum of Modern Art just purchased a piece for his own collection.”

April 10, 2007

	Lenore Tawney with Jack Larsen at SOFA NEW YORK 1999.

I become timeless when I work with fiber. Each line, each knot is a prayer. —Lenore Tawney. The venerable fiber arts dealer, browngrotta arts, Wilton, CT will present seminal works by Lenore Tawney, who turns 100 years old in May. Tawney was the first artist to free weaving from the boundaries of the loom, creating fiber sculpture that hangs freely in space.  Roberta Smith, art critic, The New York Times, contextualized Tawney’s importance: “In the late 1950's and early 60's, Tawney invented open-warp weaving and the open reed techniques that, respectively, enabled weavers to open up their woven field, and to abandon its strict rectilinearity. In many ways, these developments precipitated the transition from textiles to…fiber art.”  (Roberta Smith, “Review/Art”, The New York Times, May 18, 1990.)

Bernard Dejonghe Forme Breve, 2003 Optical glass, 8.25 x 10 x 8 Photo: Alan Tabor Galerie Besson, London

Galerie Besson, London presents renowned French ceramist and glass sculptor, Bernard Dejonghe, whose glazed stoneware and solid optical glass abstactions are inspired by geology, nature, neolithic objects and universal symbols—particularly the circle which references the life cycle.  Delonghe says, "I’ve always been conscious of man being a part of the mineral universe. Since the beginning of my work in 1968, I’ve approached the material as if it were a ‘field of possibilities’, a base for experimentation and reflection. I give no more importance to concept than to the material itself: each contributes to setting something in motion, something I call ‘energies.’” Also presented by Galerie Besson are Jennifer Lee’s delicately oxide-colored, hand-formed vessels with their purity of form and soft, parchment-like surfaces.

	Lino Tagliapietra Fenice, 2006 Glass, 27 x 17.5 x 4.25 Photo: Russell Johnson Heller Gallery, New York, NY

Heller Gallery, New York will premiere new work by Lino Tagliapietra. At age eleven, Tagliapietra began his career as an apprentice in a glass factory on his native island of Murano. At twenty-one he earned the title of maestro vetraio—master glassmaker. But it was not until the late 1970s that he set off to pursue the path of studio artist, combining Abstract expressionist, brutalist and pop-art influences in richly colored vessel forms with intricate surface treatment. Katya Garrow Heller says, “Tagliapietra combines classic elements of 20th century Italian design—which is enjoying a major renaissance in the art world—with an expressive freedom characteristic of glass art by Americans like Dale Chihuly and Dante Marioni, both of whom call him Maestro.”

Tobias Mohl Dreamweaver, 2006 Glass, 7 h x 6.5 d Heller Gallery, New York, NY

Heller Gallery will also present focus exhibits of new work by Danish glass artists Tobias Mohl and Steffen Dam. A student of Lino Tagliapietra, Mohl masterfully blends traditional Venetian technique with a contemporary Scandinavian aesthetic.  Steffen Dam earned renown for his vessel forms executed in a pale palette with subtle matte surface treatments and bored holes. His new work symmetrically arranges and encases fossils, plants and other organic life forms in large scale wall sculptures.

May 15, 2007

	Kim Simonsson Idol, 2006 Ceramic, glass, bondo, car paint 125 x 110 x 145 Nancy Margolis Gallery, New York, NY

Nancy Margolis Gallery, New York presents Finland’s Kim Simonsson’s ceramic sculpture, which often make use of familiar classical scenes from Western culture transposed to the present day. He is also open to other cultural impulses: the stylized forms, which are typical of his near life-size human figures originate from Japanese manga cartoons. As in manga cartoons, children play the major roles in Simonsson's ceramics, yet his figures do not fit with the long tradition of small china figurines and their cute child and animal shapes. Not only are Simonsson's figures bigger in size, but closer examination of his works also reveals aspects that go far beyond the mere decorative purpose of china figurines.

Sun Koo Yuh Anniversary, 2007 Glazed porcelain, 31 x 17 x 16 Nancy Margolis Gallery, New York, NY

Also offered by Nancy Margolis is large-scale sculpture by Sun Koo Yuh, whose recent show at the gallery was favorably reviewed by Roberta Smith, art critic, The New York Times, who wrote, “Imagine encountering these lushly colored, ingeniously glazed, adamantly multicultural porcelain sculptures in one of the area’s hip, high-end galleries instead of one dedicated to works made of fired clay, and you’ve got a different kettle of fish.”  Read more>

	Joyce Scott Lazy Girl, (Neckpiece) Hand-stitched glass and flameworked beads Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge, MA

Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge, MA showcases the “Queen of Beadwork,” Joyce Scott. World- renowned, Scott’s exuberant beaded sculptural forms and neckpieces are provocative and confrontational, addressing political and social issues. Scott says, “It's important to me to use art in a manner that incites people to look and then carry something home - even it it's subliminal - that might make a change in them.”  Mobilia also presents The Goblet Redefined, an exhibition of goblets in various media by masters in their fields including John McQueen and Harlan Butt; an exhibition of brooches, and new collections of work by metalsmith Jennifer Trask.

Nakano Kaoru Sponge Brooch Washi paper, silver Lesley Kehoe Galleries, Melbourne, Australia

New to SOFA NEW YORK this year is Lesley Kehoe Galleries, Melbourne, Australia, specialist in contemporary Japanese art for 25 years. Lesley Kehoe debuts Nakano Kaoru’s finely crafted Washi jewelry (Washi is an 1000 year-old Japanese art form of molding delicate mulberry tree fibers).  Kaoru says of her slivers of Washi and silver jewelry, “To attire oneself is to move from the mundane to the extraordinary. I want my objects to make statements about the people wearing them. They are sculptures. But they have to be taken out into the world and worn.”

	Motoko Maio Kouin Evanescence, 2006 Paper, textile, 60 x 69.25 Photo: Bronek Kozka Lesley Kehoe Galleries, Melbourne, Australia

Lesley Kehoe also introduces to SOFA contemporary folding byobu screens by Motoko Maio, who, Kehoe says, “has remained true to the traditional function of the folding screen in its ability to manipulate physical space (but) moved beyond this.”  Maio uses everyday materials such as aluminum foil, crushed stone, sand, dirt, iron rust in her screens, which “provide a freedom of color and textural palette unimaginable in traditional forms.her artistic concepts relate to the subtle contradictions and harmonies of Yin and Yang and how they appear in human experience. She is unafraid of the exploration and demonstration of the negative, the dark, the aggressive, the decay and transience of life alongside its lighter and happier counterpoints.”

May 30, 2007

Patti Warashina Fat Cat, 2006 Porcelain, whiteware 10 x 17 x 17 Loveed Fine Arts, New York, NY

Loveed Fine Arts, New York presents a new body of work by Patti Warashina—the “Drunken Power Series.” Warashina says “it is hard as an artist to ignore the incompetence that has affected the future of our world.”  Martha Kingsbury, professor and curator says that Warashina's “drollery allows people to feel upbeat while confronting what are actually very biting and acerbic propositions.”  Loveed will also present Ole Lislerud’s porcelain panels and plaques that reference traditional forms and architecture but whose post-modern markings, signs, calligraphy and graffiti create a tension between form and surface, between the archaic and the contemporary.

	Constantinos Kyriacou Red Rose, 2007 Silver, elastic, 2.25 x 1.5 x 4.5 The David Collection, Pound Ridge, NY

The David Collection, Pound Ridge, NY presents Yoko Izawa, short-listed for this year’s prestigious Jerwood Applied Arts in Jewellery prize, renowned for her jewelry covered and contained in nylon, resin, plastic and cloth, creating a relationship between the inside and out.  Izawa says, “Veiled jewellery reflects my assumption that although certainty is often required in modern society, ambiguous expression has been the most distinctive characteristic found in Japanese values and religious beliefs.” Also presented is Greek jeweler Constantinos Kyriacou whose mysterious silver and elastic jewelry objects are in Kyriacou’s words, “a collection of micro-sculptures”; he urges viewers to “sense the state of the soul at the moment of creation.”  

William Morris Idolo, 2003 Glass, 30 x 10 x 11 Photo: Rob Vinnedge Holsten Galleries, Stockbridge, MA

Holsten Galleries, Stockbridge, MA presents glass master William Morris.  In the 1980's, William Morris glass Canopic jars sold for $25,000. Today, a single sculpture is $275,000.  And with Morris declaring that he is taking early retirement, his values are rise higher. The top reported sale at SOFA NEW YORK 2006 was Idolo by Morris for $145,000, sold by Holsten Galleries. Morris’ highly collectible works reference myth, animal, artifact, ethnicity and spirituality and are renowned for his treatment of surface texture, achieved by sprinkling powdered glass and minerals onto a blown surface, etching, and acid washing to achieve "ancient" and textural diversity.