NEW YORK CITY - Joan B Mirviss, Ltd presents the work of Hoshino Kayoko and Satoru in "Double Spiral: The Sculptural Art of Hoshino Kayoko and Satoru," an exhibition devoted to more than 30 new works by this celebrated ceramicist couple. The exhibition continues through June 15.
The title "Double Spiral" references not only their dual careers but also the intertwining of the spiritual and physical worlds and the balance between opposites as represented by the yin-yang symbol (taikyokuzu). As Hoshino Satoru with a powerful sense of fluidity and seductive tactility, Kayoko's work maintains a more austere appearance, twisting and turning as their surfaces rotate.
With his hands and body as his primary tools, Hoshino Satoru fashions surging, swirling, heavy coils of clay all marked by his pushed and pinched imprints that are later submerged beneath thick copper green and matte white glazes. These bold creations, strongly referencing Neolithic cord-patterned Jomon vessels, are from his Spring Snow series, implying that the melting of the glaze when fired, pooling into the pinched concavities and seeping over the edges of the depressions, is like melting white snow seen against a vivid blue sky.
Hoshino Kayoko approaches her medium without fixed ideas, allowing the clay to "speak" and her forms appear as if released from a wedged mound of clay, created by chance. The austere elegance of her work contrasts dramatically with that of her husband. Her distinctive sharply contoured wire-cut forms feature matte gray surfaces covered with vertical impressions made from metal tools to create a rythmic linear pattern punctuated by dark crystallizations in the clay itself. Occasionally featuring a silver or ash glaze to emphasize a contrasting smooth surface, the duality of her approach to surface reflects her distinctive sensibility, which has brought Kayoko to the forefront of women ceramists on a global stage.
Joan B Mirviss, Ltd is at 39 East 78th Street. For further information, www.mirviss.com or 212-799-4021