Raising the bar

Toshiko Takaezu's work as a ceramist helped elevate the craft to a fine art

WHILE it's a common lament that Hawaii is marginalized for a perceived provincialism, in illuminating instances those judgments are resoundingly silenced.

'Toshiko Takaezu: Public Sale of Works' Includes new pieces that have not yet been offered for purchase in Hawaii » Time: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and next Sunday » Place: Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii, 2454 S. Beretania St. » Call: 945-7633

Next weekend, Hawaii can bask in the quiet as one of its own, ceramist Toshiko Takaezu, holds a sale of more than 200 of her works at the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii, her third sale since 2004. The event is a fundraiser for the Contemporary Museum, the cultural center and the Toshiko Takaezu Foundation. The world-renowned artist is giving the Hawaii public an opportunity she hasn't afforded any other community: the chance to collect her work.

It is the means for Takaezu to acknowledge her place of birth and the community in which she received her early arts education. Takaezu studied at the Honolulu Academy of Arts and the University of Hawaii under such icons as Louis Pohl and Claude Horan. Her unassuming demeanor, however, belies her monumental contribution to the arts.

"Toshiko has achieved the status as one of the master artists of ceramics in the world," says Jay Jensen, chief curator of the Contemporary Museum.

Takaezu was among the post-World War II artists pivotal in elevating ceramics from a craft to a fine art. Her particular contribution: "Many credit Toshiko with developing the first closed form. Though she's using a form based on the vessel, it isn't functional because the opening at the top is so small. So she turned the form into a sculptural piece."

Takaezu's training led her in 1951 to Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan, where she was mentored by Maija Grotell. In 1955 she moved to Japan for eight months to study Zen and work with folk potters. Those influences had a strong presence in her work, Jensen says.

She created her signature orblike pieces "in an almost Zen-like way: over and over again, with only slight variations in size and shape," he says.

"Her second big contribution has been in glazing," Jensen continues. "More than any other artist, she's explored a wide range of color and glaze types. Her colorful, gestural-applied glazes are sometimes like abstract expressionist paintings. She treats the (clay) surface like a painterly surface."

Takaezu has also left her mark as a teacher at such institutions as the University of Wisconsin, the Cleveland Institute of Art and Princeton University, where she taught for some 25 years and retired from in 1992.

For all her accomplishments, Takaezu was named a Living Treasure of Hawaii in 1987.

Today, Takaezu still lives and works in Quakertown, N.J., and visits Hawaii regularly. In recent years the artist has donated her many works to museums throughout the country, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Princeton University Art Museum.

Lennie Yajima Andrew, Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii president and executive director, says her organization is "deeply honored" to be a beneficiary of Takaezu's public sale.

"Just to have her extraordinary artwork on display is really an honor," she says.

"Our mission at the center is to promote and perpetuate the Japanese-American experience, and Toshiko, in her accomplishment of transforming ceramics into a fine art, is a prime example of a 'nikkei' who illustrates that mission."