55. Takiguchi Kazuo  滝口 和男

Takiguchi Kazuo was born in 1953 in Gojōzaka, Kyoto, in the center of the production of traditional Kyoto ceramics. The son of a wholesale tableware dealer, Takichu Kazuo grew up amid ceramics and commerce, which would later determine his choice of study. He first studied economics at Doshisha University and later went on to study pottery at Kyoto City University of Arts. He studied with renowned potter Kiyomizu Rokubei and then briefly with Yagi Kazuo, one of the founders of the Sōdeisha movement, whose aesthetic and focus on nontraditional, sculptural forms would have a lasting influence on him. Years later, he also studied at the Royal College of Arts in London, where he graduated in 1992. His work is both complicated and highly creative. He starts with a slab of clay that is then flattened and beaten and placed in a canvas canvas. Using pulleys, he hoists it up and hangs it in the air creating a ball-like shape that he then works into the desired shape by building the inside and outside of the clay together. After the clay body is dry enough to hold its shape, he rips open a hole at the top. His abstract forms combined with metallic shiny glazes resulted in sculptures that had a very powerful yet light touch. It brought him great fame and he is now considered one of the coryphae of contemporary Japanese ceramics. He had many exhibitions in Japan and abroad, won many awards such as the JCS award, one of the most coveted awards of all, and his work is included in the permanent collection of the Victoria and Alebert Museum in London.