Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Tim Rowan & Shumpei Yamaki Exhibition

Tim Rowan & ShumpeiYamaki Exhibition
- Exchanging Fire -

January 17th Fri. – 19th Sun.
Opening Reception January17th Fri. 6pm-8pm

We are happy to announce that Sara Japanese Pottery will host the first in a series of exhibitions to celebrate our 25th anniversary. This exhibition will feature the works of Tim Rowan and Shumpei Yamaki.

Tim Rowan and ShumpeiYamaki have an extended history when it comes to collaborative firings.  They have a mutual respect for one another's work that reinforces their friendship.
They first met in 2004 in Iowa.  Shumpei was a student and Tim was leading a workshop together with ceramicist Jeff Shapiro.  The two bonded over drinks and immediately became good friends.

In 2005, Shumpei moved to Brooklyn, New York.  From the very outset of his career as a potter, he took every occasion to do joint Anagama firings with Tim.  Their work together would influence Shumpei’s later firing technique.  While preparing a large firing for an important show in Boston in 2009, Tim was unable to find reliable help and asked Shumpei to lend a hand.  For seven consecutive days they took turns watching over the kiln in twelve-hour shifts, fueling it with firewood.  This was the last firing before Shumpei moved back to Iowa to build his own wood-fire kiln.

After the success of Tim's show in Boston, in 2010 he was invited to a group exhibition for Bizen pottery in Japan alongside highly esteemed Japanese National Treasure artists.  It immediately followed that Tim gained worldwide recognition as a sculptor who does Bizen style firings.

This show is specially planned to celebrate the 25th Anniversary of Sara Japanese Pottery.  We requested that Tim and Shumpei collaborate on a firing once again, but instead of firing together in a single kiln, to exchange their work and to use their respective kilns to fire; Tim in New York and Shumpei in Iowa.  The show is titled "Exchanging Fire".  It is because of their friendship that they are able to hand their own work to the other, let alone to entrust each other with the firing process.

Tim Rowan, an American artist who studied Bizen pottery in Japan, and ShumpeiYamaki, a Japanese artists who came to America and became potter, their exchange of friendship, art and culture is another meaning in the title that I hope people will experience at exhibition.


Tim Rowan Bio:
Tim Rowan was born in 1967 in New York City and grew up in Connecticut along the shore of the Long Island Sound.  His art education began during college, receiving a BFA from The State University of New York at New Paltz before journeying to Japan for two years to apprentice with ceramic artist RyuichiKakurezaki. Upon his return he worked briefly in studios in Massachusetts and New York before receiving his MFA from Pennsylvania State University.
He established his kiln and studio deep in the woods of the Hudson Valley in 2000 where he lives with his wife and son. His work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions internationally most recently having solo shows at Cavin-Morris Gallery, in New York and Yufuku Gallery, in Tokyo, Japan.

Shumpei Yamaki Bio :
ShumpeiYamaki was born and raised in Kamakura, Japan. He moved to Philadelphia in 1996 to study dance.  He went on to pursue a bachelor’s degree in archaeology at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse.  
In 1999, Shumpei was injured in an automobile accident and enrolled in a ceramics class as physical therapy for his arm.  He discovered his passion for ceramics, and in 2001 began an apprenticeship under Richard Bresnahan.  He learned traditional Japanese pottery techniques, wood-firing, and ways to rely on local resources and resource conservation.
Shumpei went on to graduate studies at the University of Iowa, in 2002, taking full advantage of their strong wood-fire program.

In 2005, Shumpei moved to Brooklyn and participated in wood-firings in upstate New York with Tim Rowan and Roger Baumann.  He returned to Iowa in 2009, where he is currently the resident artist at Scattergood Friends School and Farm.  He is building a wood-fire kiln for the school and has been experimenting with local clay in his personal endeavors as a wood-fire potter. 

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