Cascades and Glacial Landscapes New Work by Jeff Shapiro

JEFF SHAPIRO

Cascades and Glacial Landscapes

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Cascades and Glacial Landscapes New work by Jeff Shapiro

Following a friendship that has spanned more than thirty years, it is with great excitement that I am able to collaborate, at long last, with my very talented friend, Jeff Shapiro, on this special virtual exhibition of his new sculptural work. We first met many decades ago at an early exhibition in New Rochelle, New York. While I was already very intrigued with Japanese ceramics and collected in Japan for my own home, it was not yet an area on which I focused as a private dealer in Japanese art. Of course, that focus pivoted completely more than twenty-five years ago, and Japanese clay art has become my major pursuit and passion.

Through the decades and many exhibitions, both in the US and Japan, I have followed Jeff’s career with admiration, happily acquiring works here and there.

From those early days as an avid follower of the Bizen tradition and technique, to the current independent and highly personal and powerful body of sculptural work, his course of development has been inspiring to witness. So, despite my gallery rule to handle only the clay art of Japanese artists, I believe this new work to be so compelling that I felt I had to make it available to my ceramic-focused clientele. It is with great pleasure that I introduce this series Cascades and Glacial Landscapes in this virtual on-line only catalogue and exhibition.

Joan B Mirviss February 2021

Cascades and Glacial Landscapes It is a great pleasure and opportunity to be showing my two most recent bodies of sculpture at Joan B Mirviss LTD. I have known Joan for many years and have always appreciated her friendship as well as her discerning eye for art.

These two distinct bodies of ceramic sculpture are informed by the different states of water. The Oribe blue-greens evoke flowing water, or pools of water such as Mediterranean lagoons, gently rippling over organic forms found at low tide. The translucent white pieces are reminiscent of ice flowing or melting over geological formations.

Both bodies of work are affected by the organic quality of the clay and the spontaneous forming process through a unique firing method at my studio.

My experience and time spent living and studying in Japan for nine years during the 1970s has been at the core sensibility of my work. When I returned to New York in 1980, I was making pottery heavily based on my Japanese ceramic training. It took some time to find my own voice. It was a slow process of evolution through trial-and-error of making and firing. I gradually “allowed” myself to broaden my scope of work to include first, sculptural vessels and then, solid sculpture (though I still make a few quintessential forms such as tea bowls).

I have been, and still am, affected by the Japanese sense of beauty: the understanding that beauty exists in the imperfections of Nature, such as in a twisted branch, or a decaying persimmon leaf. in my work, though, I am interested in expressing that same quality with a voice that is not Japanese. Considering my early training, to achieve such abandonment is very difficult.

First, an artist learns the methods and processes. In ceramics it is easy to become a “technician”. My personal challenge is in what happens after all the technical learning is done – in other words, learning how to let go. That will also take a lifetime; however, that is what keeps the work fresh.

Lastly, I wish to thank Joan Mirviss and the gallery staff for all of their work on our virtual show, the online catalog and panel discussion.

Jeff Shapiro February 2021

Close-up image of Oribe series no. 5 (see page 15)

Ice Flow series no. 12 2020 Glazed stoneware 23 1/2 x 14 3/4 x 7 in. metal stand 12 x 9 $6,800

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Oribe series no.4 2020 Glazed stoneware 15 1/2 x 7 1/2 x 7 in. $2,750

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Ice Flow series no. 9 2020 Glazed stoneware 20 1/2 x 15 x 7 in.

Metal stand 12 x 8 $7,250

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Oribe series no. 5 2020 Glazed stoneware 9 1/2 x 22 1/2 x 6 in. $3,500

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Ice Flow series no.10 2020 Glazed stoneware 12 1/2 x 20 x 7 in. $5,350

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Different view (top) and close-up view (bottom) of Ice Flow series no.10

Jeff Shapiro arrived in Japan as a 23-year-old in search of an authentic experience.

It was not easy to absorb a culture so removed from his own, but with sensitivity, drive, and an openness to learn, he developed a vision of himself as a ceramic artist. It sparked a passion for what has become a lifelong commitment.

In the beginning of any love affair, there is an all-consuming passion. No doubt, his senses were ignited by the intricacies and technical nuances of the physicality of the process—the clay, the building of form, and the complexities of the firing, particularly with the use of a Bizen-style kiln. But artistic mastery is not the same as the mere acquisition of skills and technical knowledge. No, mastery evolves when experience is so integrated into the act of creation that the viewer is inevitably transformed. One sees the ordinary become the extraordinary.

Clay is one of the most expressive artistic materials in which every gesture is revealed and made evident in the process of formation. Scale, texture, form and the effect of the intense heat upon a glaze offer a metaphor of Nature encapsulated onto a surface. Every element in the process—the pigments, the grit of the clay, the volatile ash of the wood cascading around the forms—is coaxed into fulfilling its potential when in the hands of a sensitive artist. In fact, he pushes tradition even further by experimenting with varying melting points of glazes in post-ash firings to enhance the effects that his super surfaces initiate. (continued on p. 25)

Shapiro’s anagama tunnel kiln 19

Oribe series no. 2 2020 Glazed stoneware 15 1/2 x 7 1/2 x 7 1/2 in. $2,950

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Ice Flow series no. 6 2020 Glazed stoneware 23 x 12 x 6 1/4 in. $5,900

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Close-up image of Ice Flow series no. 9 (see page 12-13)

(continued from p.19) In Shapiro’s latest exhibition, Cascades and Glacial Landscapes, we see works that are reflective of his masterful handling of varied firings—from an anagama wood-fueled kiln to an electric kiln—all orchestrated to manipulate and control the surfaces on his sculptural forms. These forms both convey and reference water.

In the sculptures called Cascades, molten glazes appear to ooze and drip from hot blue-greens reminiscent of lush lagoon waterfalls descending from mountainous terrains. In Glacial Landscapes, the viewer is shown icy formations of crystals trapped in suspension within forms reminiscent of the barrenness of the Arctic.

These effects are not serendipitous. It is Shapiro’s sensitive responsiveness to natural formations in the landscape, and years of firing experience, that bring these nuanced surfaces and forms to fruition. Trial-and-error, repeated again and again, provides a cumulative memory: knowing where to place work in the kiln, where the fall of the ash will have the fullest impact, choosing specific wood to burn, learning which oxides provide the richest colors, and most importantly, how long to keep the fire box stoked with wood so that objects emerge from the fire filled with exuberance and beauty… this juggling act, this balanced dance, marks the master at work.

Jeff Shapiro has fine-tuned his inspiration and knowledge and has blurred the line between art and craft. He has opened a door into the natural world of earth and sky, of erosion and water, and has delivered a body of work of imagined landscapes that brings Nature into our conscious awareness with a clarity of expression that signals an artist at the height of his creative power.

Judith Schwartz, PhD. February 2021

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Oribe series no. 3 2020 Glazed stoneware 12 1/2 x 7 1/2 x 6 1/2 in. $2,750

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Ice Flow series no. 11 2020 Glazed stoneware 21 1/2 x 11 1/4 x 7 in. $6,250

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Oribe series no. 1 2020 Glazed stoneware 12 1/2 x 8 1/2 x 7 1/2 in. $2,750

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Ice Flow series no. 13 2020 Glazed stoneware 11 3/4 x 21 1/2 x 6 in. $5,300

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Ice Flow series no. 8 2020 Glazed stoneware 19 x 19 x 6 in. $3,400

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Jeff Shapiro was born in the Bronx, New York in 1949. Drawn to Japan to study the ceramic arts, Shapiro remained there for nine years, from 1973 to 1981. During that period, he first studied with Takatori Seizan in Kyushu and then with Yamauchi Tatsuo in Shikoku. Under the auspices of his patron, Kabumoto Nobuo, he spent three years building a kiln, house, and studio compound in Hamasaka on the Japan Sea Coast. He then worked at the Yamashita Joji kiln site in Bizen, at what was then the newly-built studio of an apprentice of Living National Treasure, Isezaki Jun. Shapiro considers Isezakisensei a seminal mentor during most of those years. Upon returning to the US in 1981, Shapiro began building his own anagama (tunnel kiln) and studio in upstate New York, where he lives today with his wife, Hinako. His inaugural anagama firing was in 1984.

Over the past thirty-five years, Shapiro has exhibited internationally in Germany, France, Italy, Australia, Switzerland, Canada, England, and Japan. In 1993, he exhibited at the Takashimaya Department Store gallery in Tokyo and the same year received a commission from The Metropolitan Museum of Art for a vessel for the Arts of Japan gallery. He has exhibited twice with his mentor, Isezaki Jun, at Marianne Heller Gallery in Germany (2008 and 2010), and in three-person shows with Claude Champy and Tsujimura Shiro on three continents: Kokon Gallery in New York (2010); Capazza Gallery in Nançay, France (2012); and Kakiden Gallery in Tokyo (2013). Additionally, Shapiro has long been active teaching others and has received invitations from around the world to lead workshops: including India, Taiwan, New Zealand, Switzerland, France, Canada, Spain, and Bali, Indonesia. His artworks are in many important private collections and museum collections.

Selected Public Collections: American Museum of Ceramic Art, Pomona, CA Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts, Little Rock, AR Boca Raton, Museum of Contemporary Art, FL Brooklyn Museum, NY Carlo Zauli Museum, Faenza, Italy Crocker Museum, Sacramento, CA Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, NY Huntington Museum of Art, WV LongHouse Reserve Foundation, East Hampton, NY Minneapolis Institute of Art, MN Mint Museum, Charlotte, SC Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA University Art Collection, State University of New York, New Palz

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Top left: Jeff Shapiro at his anagama tunnel kiln with ceramists Ogawa Machiko, Sakurai Yasuko, and Futamura Yoshimi, 2012

If you would like further information about any of the works in this catalogue, please contact director@mirviss.com.

Dimensions are listed as height, width, and depth.

Photographer: Rennio Maifredi Catalogue Design: Yukiko Ishii

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