Overview
Tracing the artistic development of renowned potter Toshiko Takaezu (1922-2011), this masterful study celebrates and analyzes an artist who held a significant place in the post-World War II craft movement in America. Born in Hawaii of Japanese descent in 1922, Takaezu worked actively in clay, fiber, and bronze for over sixty years. Influenced by midcentury modernism, her work transformed from functional vessels to abstract sculptural forms and installations. Over the years, continued to draw on a combination of Eastern and Western techniques and aesthetics, as well as her love of the natural world. In particular, Takaezu's vertical closed forms became a symbol of her work, created through a combination of wheel-throwing and hand-building techniques that allowed her to grow her vessels vertically and eased the circular restrictions of the wheel. In addition to her art, Takaezu was renowned for her teaching, including twenty years at Princeton University. This beautifully illustrated book offers the first scholarly analysis of Takaezu's life work and includes essays by Paul Smith, director emeritus of the American Craft Museum, and Janet Koplos, former senior editor of Art in America . Jack Lenor Larsen, a textile designer, author, collector, and advocate of traditional and contemporary craftsmanship, provides a foreword. |Tracing the artistic development of renowned potter Toshiko Takaezu, this masterful study celebrates and analyzes an artist who holds a significant place in the post-World War II craft movement in America.
Full Product Details
Author: Paul J. Smith ,
Paul J. Smith
Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
Imprint: The University of North Carolina Press
Edition: New edition
Dimensions:
Width: 21.50cm
, Height: 2.00cm
, Length: 27.90cm
Weight: 1.046kg
ISBN: 9780807834824
ISBN 10: 0807834823
Pages: 160
Publication Date: 30 April 2011
Audience:
General/trade
,
General
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Out of Print
Availability: In Print
Limited stock is available. It will be ordered for you and shipped pending supplier's limited stock.
Reviews
This book shines so brightly and speaks so eloquently. . . . In the Language of Silence is a perfect tribute. <br>- Books&Culture
For anyone who understands art as a journey, who has ever been, in Takaezu's words, 'interested in what would happen, ' this is a book worth reading. <br>- International Sculpture Center Book Reviews
Long overdue, this book is a fitting tribute to a major figure in the ceramics field. Recommended. Lower-level undergraduates and above; general readers. -- Choice
Author Information
Peter Held is curator of ceramics at the Ceramics Research Center, part of the Arizona State University Art Museum.
