FYI – Celebrating pioneering women ceramicists from Japan, the Crow Collection of Asian Art will present Soaring Voices: Recent Ceramics by Women from Japan featuring 26 works by 25 exceptional women artists who reflect Japan’s rich and innovative ceramic culture. Free and open to the public, the exhibition will run Saturday, January 22, through Sunday, May 8, 2011.

Please see below for details, and let us know if you need anything (images, etc.). Thanks!

Taylor Mayad
214.353.8976 wk
214.435.7756 m
214.352.6894 fx
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


CROW COLLECTION OF ASIAN ART TO PRESENT SOARING VOICES: RECENT CERAMICS BY WOMEN FROM JAPAN, JANUARY 22 - MAY 8, 2011

Exhibition of pioneering women ceramicists from Japan demonstrates societal shift toward women artists becoming recognized in artistic realm traditionally held by men

DALLAS (December 7, 2010) – Celebrating pioneering women ceramicists from Japan, the Crow Collection of Asian Art will present Soaring Voices: Recent Ceramics by Women from Japan featuring 26 works by 25 exceptional women artists who reflect Japan’s rich and innovative ceramic culture. For thousands of years, women have been highly active in the production of ceramics but their names have largely been unknown. Soaring Voices demonstrates the shift in Japanese society toward individual women artists becoming recognized in an artistic realm traditionally held by men. Free and open to the public, the exhibition will run Saturday, January 22, through Sunday, May 8, 2011.

The exhibition provides contemporary interpretations of a traditional art form through the work of women artists using a range of methods, materials and motifs, many inspired from the natural world. Other sources of inspiration pay tribute to Japan, such as Noh theater dance movements (a form of classic Japanese musical drama performed since the 14th century) and kimono patterns of the Edo period (1603 – 1868). Commentary on themes such as beauty defined and an exploration of East versus West is threaded throughout the works.

Soaring Voices features pioneering ceramicists spanning generations, including members of the founding generation of Japanese female potters, such as Asuka Tsubio, Kiyoko Koyama and Takako Araki, whose colorful works are innovative in form and concept. Other artists, including Eiko Kishi and Fuku Fukumoto, incorporate ancient literature and Noh traditions to create a context within their work of a deep connection with nature, a significant motif in the work of Japanese artists.

Hiroko Miura, curator at the Museum of Contemporary Ceramic Art at the Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park and lecturer at Kyoto Seika University, is the exhibition curator. Co-curator Maya Nishi and president of hus-10, Inc. has curated a number of major exhibitions, and her work has led to numerous publications, lectures and workshops throughout Japan and the U.S.  A fully illustrated catalogue, Soaring Voices - Contemporary Japanese Women Ceramic Artists, accompanies the tour with essays by Mirua and Louise Allison Cort, curator for ceramics, Freer Gallery of Art, and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution. The Catalogue is published by Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park.

The exhibition traveled to the New Otani Art Museum, Tokyo, and Shizuoka Art Gallery, Shizuoka, Japan, in 2008 and the Museé National de Céramique in Sevres, France, in 2009 before embarking on its North American tour.

Soaring Voices was developed by The Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park, Shiga Prefecture, and hus-10, Inc., Tokyo. The tour was organized by International Arts & Artists, Washington, D.C. The exhibition is generously supported in part by the E. Rhodes & Leona B. Carpenter Foundation and the S&R Foundation.

The Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park in Shigaraki-Chokushi Koka City, Japan, supports ceramics through artistic development, exhibitions designed to promote local industry, and cultural development through worldwide exchanges. Visit sccp.main.jp/.

hus-10, Inc. introduces ceramic art throughout Japan and internationally through art publications, curatorial services, and international exhibitions. hus-10 aspires to be a place for exchange of knowledge and technology on ceramic art and culture.
Visit www.hus-10.com/english.html.

International Arts & Artists is a non-profit arts service organization dedicated to increasing cross-cultural understanding and exposure to the arts internationally, through exhibitions, programs and services to artists, arts institutions and the public. Visit www.artsandartists.org.

Crow Collection of Asian Art
The Trammell & Margaret Crow Collection of Asian Art is located in the Arts District of downtown Dallas. The Crow Collection is a permanent set of galleries dedicated to the arts and cultures—past and present-- of China, Japan, India and Southeast Asia. LinkAsia, the newly dedicated gallery space at the Crow Collection, presents art works that provide a contemporary global path to understanding Asia through unique perspectives and mediums. The museum offers a serene setting for both quiet reflection and learning.

Admission is free. The Crow Collection of Asian Art is open Tuesdays – Thursdays (10 a.m. – 9 p.m.), Fridays – Sundays (10 a.m. – 6 p.m.), and closed on Mondays. For more information, please go to crowcollection.org or call 214-979-6430.

IMAGES AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST

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MEDIA CONTACTS:
Carrie Ford
ph/214.271.4485
cell/512.663.6798
cford@crowcollection.org

Margalit Monroe
International Arts & Artists
ph/202.338.0680
margalitm@artsandartists.org