David Zwirner Gallery unveils Shio Kusaka's exhibition 'One light year'

Shio Kusaka, an artist based in Los Angeles showcases her new installation, ‘One light year’- a collection of soft-hued ceramics, at David Zwirner Gallery, New York. The art installation is a materialisation of the artist’s playful and organic approach to design. It is a rendition of Shio Kusaka’s distinctive line work and instinctual sense of colours with which she crafts a diverse range of vessels, stonewares, porcelains and ceramics. David Zwirner Gallery at 519 West 19th Street in New York is one of the numerous outlets under the ownership of the iconic art collector- David Zwirner. These galleries have been a celebratory space for contemporary art for over twenty years and have been set up in the United States, London, Hong Kong and Paris. The gallery recognised Kusaka as an artist in 2020, however, ‘One light year’ happens to be her first solo exhibition at the gallery.

Shio Kusaka’s installation enfolds the organic imperfections of the materials in use while overlaying recurring patterns and unique techniques. Her designs are a relatable representation of contemporary art combined with historic designs. While the uniqueness of the collection lies in the poetic elucidation of patterns, lines, motifs and hues, the conceptualisation of her ceramics is inspired by accessories of her everyday life including things like wooden grains, the texture of fruits, and organic shapes as animals etc.

The One light year installation also showcases Kusaka’s admiration for the ancient art techniques like hand-building and wheeling, with which she creates these distinctive ceramics. Further on, she classifies them with simple tints and tones of colours while giving each piece a process-oriented title, such as, ‘carved’ or ‘line’ etc. The exhibition is a follow up of Kusaka’s 2020 installation at the Neutra VDL Studio and residence, in Los Angeles, which was curated by Douglas Fogle and Hanneke Skerath. For the exhibition at David Zwirner’s gallery, she gets a raw open space to display her work where the art pieces are lined up on thin copper plates over the gallery’s floor. The raw but exciting interior of the gallery instantly shifts the focus to the beautiful ceramics lined up on the floor. Some of her exhibits from the installation include stoneware pots painted in a tranquil palette and overlaid with Kusaka’s concentric line patterns, small porcelains with meandering lines and motifs along with articles of pottery from her recollection of the Yayoi, Jamon and Kofun periods of Ancient Japan. A fully illustrated catalogue will be published by David Zwirner Books to accompany the exhibition. Shio Kusaka was born in 1972 in Japan. Currently based in Los Angeles, the artist has a degree in Fine Arts from the University of Washington, Seattle. Throughout her life, she had a strong Japanese cultural influence, which is reflected in her ceramic works today. Kusaka has curated many solos and two-person exhibitions including installations across different parts of the United States and Europe.