寿　‐　Longevity & Felicitation

This character is one of her name. She stamps it on her work as her signature, made by her. She wishes the owners taking over her work develop themselves with the character. If you drink tea in a cup the tea colour remains inside the cup. The owners notice the changing of colour and contemplate themselves there, in progression with the cup. They are growing and making their history together.

 

Kazuko Takahashi lives and works in London. She graduated from the Royal College of Art with an MA in Photography in 2003. Exhibitions include the 'Schweppes Photographic Portrait Prize' at the National Portrait Galley in London along with solo and group exhibitions in the UK, Greece and Japan. Kazuko has been making ceramics since 2007.

Her background begins with fine art portrait photography where she sought to extract the sitters' nature with the use of the 5x4 camera. She uses the same method to create ceramics, extracting clay's nature, then moulding the shapes by hand. She produces her own photographic prints to control the colours; mixing cyan, magenta and yellow to find the perfect combination. There is only one answer regarding colour for the print yet with ceramics, there are numerous variations for the colour. Kazuko enjoys the process of mixing colours and waiting to see how they appear on the surface of her work.

Among her techniques, Kazuko uses pinched pots and coiled pots to create original and unique works of art for everyday life. Pieces of lace, mouldings and drawings of natural forms help to make patterns on the clay’s surface. Inspiration comes from the four seasons of Japan, growing up in the countryside surrounded by mountains, rivers and lakes. Always acutely aware of the seasons changing in nature, she focuses on a particular scene while creating her work.

 

Imperfection & Perfection

Sometimes, it happens that a piece of work gets chipped or is damaged in the process of making. If Kazuko finds beauty in this, she leaves it as it is without repairing it, believing that imperfection creates and stimulates our imagination, becoming a trigger to enter the work, appreciate and establish your own relationship with it. For example, there was a chip on the edge of a cup, but with imagination a rim or a line can be seen there. So she did not need to repair it. Also, when creating a photographic image Kazuko tries to make it as simple as possible and removing unnecessary information to create a space for the audience to enter the work and stimulate their imagination to guess what the missing information might be, inviting communication with the image. If these things happen to her audience Kazuko believes imperfection becomes successfully perfect.