Lee Love on wed 29 aug 07
Wrote post below last week.
Show is closed at Rochester, but you can see it as it travels:
=95 North Dakota Museum of Art, Grand Forks, ND
September 18, 2007 =96 January 20, 2008
=95 Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, Houson, TX
August 29, 2008 =96 November 30, 2008
=95 Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AR
March 20, 2009 =96 May 17, 2009
=95 Museum of Craft and Folk Art, San Francisco, CA
June 11, 2009 =96 September 13, 2009
=95 Fuller Craft Museum, Brockton, MA
October 10, 2009 =96 January 3, 2010
http://www.rochesterartcenter.org/exhibitions/2OG/2006/mackenzie.html
Went to see it in Rochester today (last thursday.) Was a one and a
half hour drive
in the rain. Really, MacKenzie's work was the first I ever
looked at seriously. His and the Omaha potter Dirk Gillespie. Jean
collected them both before we met. Two of my great disappointments
is the fact that Dirk Gillespie and John Reeve, two of my favorite
potters, aren't making pots today. Both of these guys have more
playfulness and humor in their work than most folks around here.
Seems like MFAs often make folks take their work too seriously. (I
know there are exceptions. This is my personal opinion.)
In Japan, there is a severe lack of playfulness and humor in
work. Yuchiko Baba, a woman potter in Mashiko, has playfulness in
her work that is similar to Linda Christianson and Jan MacKechie's
work.
Not long after we met, Jean took me to Yamato Imports, at the
first story of a parking ramp in downtown Minneapolis. There, she
introduced me to the work of Hamada, Shimaoka and the woodblock
printer Shiko Munkata. So, these have been my primary influences
from the beginning. Didn't pick them because they were famous or
anything. Jean just showed me them.
I wrote this last week. Show is moving from Rochester to:
So, the show was a big deal for me. I have seen shows of this
scale and importance for Hamada, Shimaoka, Leach and Munakata. Now I
have the whole deck.
An interesting pot was the oldest one. It was a plate
that was white glazed and had black patterns with yellow rectangles
colored inside them. Looked a lot like Mondrian on a plate!
It made me think of my two oldest pieces that I still own. They
were both handbuilt, one was a tall coil and paddled jar, about 2.5'
tall with a primitive fish pattern on it. The other was a life sized
3D sculpture of my favorite Hawaiian shirt. It was also decorated
with fish, using colorful underglazes and glazes. Hope to dig these
out of the storage space and see what kind of shape they are in.
They were made before I learned to throw.
http://www.rochesterartcenter.org/exhibitions/2OG/2006/mackenzie.html
--=20
Lee in Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
"Making pots should not be a struggle.
It should be like walking down a hill
in a gentle breeze." --Shoji Hamada
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
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