GROUP EXHIBITION

Now 90 years old, her father Tozan no longer spends every day in the workshop as he once did, but Aiko recalls that from her earliest childhood, the home was always filled with the ‘figure of a maker at work.’ She has been encouraged by that presence for many years. For this exhibition, Aiko and her brother Kotaro, who grew up in the same household and works as a sculptor, collaborated on the exhibition layout, presenting their works in a way that traces each artist’s gaze.

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When my father held a solo exhibition in Kyoto aged 88, he wrote in his thank-you note: “Thank you, it was fun. Next, 90!” Seeing that postcard, Mr. Mizuma said, “Then let’s hold it at our gallery!” – and that became the catalyst for this exhibition.

For this show, I requested my brother to include works from around the time I became a university student in the early 1990s, and together we are shaping the layout. My father, Miyanaga Tozan, is the third generation of the Miyanaga Tozan kiln. Our family has been involved in ceramics for over 120 years. Yet, with each generation exploring different forms and styles, the question of what has truly been inherited is not something that can be easily put into words.

Now, from among the familiar landscape filled with my father’s works, I am thinking about the exhibition we want to create. How have we, across generations, approached art and engaged with the times? How have we watched over the making of each other’s works? These are things so ordinary I had never consciously reflected on them before.

I hope this exhibition becomes one that revolves around the perspectives of each family member. As I exchange ideas with my brother, I notice surprising overlaps in our tastes and ways of seeing. Perhaps these are the qualities we have quietly nurtured together within our family, beginning with our father and the environment we grew up in.

• MIYANAGA Aiko