Tanioka Shigeo & Tanioka Aiko

TANIOKA SHIGEO & TANIOKA AIKO

Among the artists active today, the Taniokas, Shigeo and Aiko, are the preeminent bamboo art couple. Each experienced a profound encounter with bamboo artworks and were moved to dedicate their lives to the medium. Each found their way to the same studio, that of the famous Tanabe family of Osaka, where Shigeo apprenticed with Tanabe Chikuunsai II for nine years and Aiko studied under Tanabe Chikuunsai III for fifteen. Aiko entered the Tanabe studio in 1985, shortly after Shigeo had left to become an independent artist. They met after Aiko’s studiomates told her about a talented former student who happened to live nearby. The artists of the Tanabe Chikuunsai lineage are known for their technical mastery, refined taste, and for adding highly sophisticated sculptural qualities to flower vessel forms. Shigeo and Aiko are inheritors of this tradition.

Tanioka Shigeo is one of the most creative and least productive bamboo artists of his generation. It is not unusual for artists to work in series and create objects of varying scale and complexity. However, every piece Shigeo makes is a major piece — starting from an original idea and requiring months of hands - on time.

He is only able to produce two to three works in a year, but each are marvels of invention and artistry. Shigeo’s impeccably finished sculptural artworks often push the limits of, but do not fully abandon, bamboo art’s tradition of flower baskets and trays.

Enfolding is classic Shigeo. A smooth and sleek vessel form that fully engages Modernist sculptural ideas, it highlights the beauty of the very special bamboo it is made from. Ninety strips cut from two - century old, small - diameter hobi bamboo, showing the rich coloration that only long exposure to hearth fire smoke can imbue, are perfectly matched in graduating width and length to achieve an elegant, curving taper. The varying array of the bamboo’s nodes and Shigeo’s irregular placement of rattan ties add a piquant cadence to the sensual contours of the body.

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This exhibition highlights a new development of Shigeo’s, an artwork that breaks with contained form. Bond is comprised of a single band of okamezasa bamboo culms that moves through itself twice, pushing and pulling the viewer’s eye through space in the process. Each piece of bamboo must be individually bent over flame into its final shape, but while they align and act as one, each culm’s slight variability allows for the graceful pulsing of the band. From a technical standpoint this is astounding, but it is technique at the service of an extraordinary aesthetic vision.

Tanioka Aiko’s work is firmly embedded in the Kansai tradition and the shared studio environment in which she sat and worked long hours for the Tanabe family. Perhaps the focus required by bamboo art, along with the traditional studio hierarchy, makes for a quiet, circumspect climate, but I find it hard to resist imagining the artists talking through technical problems and the aesthetic possibilities of the baskets they are working on. Over the course of fifteen years, Aiko mastered many of the Tanabe family techniques, and much of her body of work focused on introducing an original twist or personal refinements of the Tanabe style of vessels, such as in Never Again, Spring Rain, and Rice Plants Swaying in the Breeze.

Extraordinarily beautiful and uniquely Aiko’s is the tray entitled Flight. Made of the most luscious black bamboo I have seen in a very long time, every feature of the design and execution is masterful. Four rows of rattan stitching move from the handle outward to the tray edge, and in each row she scales up the rattan to maintain harmony of proportions. Her most ambitious artwork in this exhibition, Welcome Rain, nods to the artist’s mentors and influences but has a lightness of touch that is Aiko’s alone, showing that artistic individuality, regional tradition, and an awareness of history can inform one another beautifully. n

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Steven Halvorsen, 2017

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ARTIST STATEMENT Bamboo was everywhere when I was a child. A chance encounter with Tanabe Chikuunsai III led me to enter into the world of bamboo art. This medium gives me joy and challenges me. I enjoy splitting bamboo because I can feel the sense of nothingness and emptiness in doing it. Bamboo is both delicate and powerful. It is not a tame material to shape according to my will. It gives me joy when my will and the will of the bamboo fit together nicely.

I hope to amplify the beauty of bamboo through my art. n

Tanioka Aiko, 2017

TA NI O K A A IK O Spring Rain, 2010,15.25 Ă— 7.5 Ă— 7.5 inches

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ARTIST STATEMENT I split a culm of bamboo for the first time when I was twenty - five. At that moment, I knew that this would become my lifelong obsession. I am captivated by the characteristics specific to bamboo. I love the nodes and roundness. I enjoy working with a variety of different bamboos. Over a period of forty - three years, I have tried to bring to life the unique charm of bamboo in my work. I sometimes find myself wondering if I will ever make the piece with which I can be fully satisfied. I dream that, someday, I will. n

Tanioka Shigeo, 2017

TA NI O K A S HI G E O Wind Through Bamboo Forest, 2014, 21 Ă— 8 Ă— 6.25 inches

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Early Autumn, 2016, 26 × 15 × 8 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Bond, 2014, 7.5 x 26 × 13.5 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Flight, 2002, 3 × 16 × 12.75 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Heart of the Flower, 2016,10.5 × 16.5 × 16.5 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Springtime Flower Basket, 2002, 5.25 × 16 × 16 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Cresting Wave, 2015, 10 × 25.5 × 9.5 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Rice Plants Swaying in the Breeze, 2003, 13 × 7.25 × 7.25 inches

TA NI O K A A IK O Never Again, 2004, 12 × 6 × 6 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Perception, 2014, 5.5 × 28.5 × 5.25 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Moon Over a Mountain, 2014, 8.5 × 30 × 7.5 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Rolling Waves, 2015, 8.25 × 17.5 × 10 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Abundance, 2010, 6.75 × 15 × 15 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Meteor, 2017, 6 × 22 × 13.5 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Road to Nara, 2009, 6.5 × 11.25 × 11.25 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Swirling Current, 2007, 7.5 × 15.5 × 15.5 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Enfolding, 2015, 6.75 × 24.5 × 8 inches

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TA NI O K A A IK O Welcome Rain, 2010, 6 × 29.5 × 6.5 inches

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TA NI O K A S HI G E O Robe of the Celestial Maiden, 2017, 8.5 × 44.5 × 18 inches

TANIOKA SHIGEO 1949

Born in Hyogo Prefecture, Japan

1974

Apprenticed to Tanabe Chikuunsai II for 10 years

1990

Silver Award, Itami Craft Arts Exhibition

1991

Admitted to Japan Traditional Craft Arts Exhibition for the first time

1992

City Council Award, 46th Sakai City Art Exhibition

1994

Special Award, Wood & Lacquer Craft Arts Exhibition

1996

Became a full member of Japan Traditional Craft Arts Association

1997

Grand Prize, Osaka Prefecture Craft Arts Exhibition

1998

Achievement Award, Asahi Contemporary Craft Arts Exhibition

1999

Grand Prize, Japan Traditional Craft Arts Exhibition, Kinki region

Beyond the Millennium, Museum of Kyoto

Bamboo Masterworks, Asia Society, New York 2001

President’s Award, Japan Traditional Craft Arts Exhibition

2002

The Next Generation, University of Arkansas, Little Rock

2003

Bamboo Masterworks, Oita Art Museum (travelled to 5 other venues in Japan)

Best Bamboo Baskets:The Cotsen Collection, Long House Reserve, East Hampton, NY

2004

Winner of 3rd Cotsen Bamboo Prize

2005

Weavers of Wonder, Naples Museum, FL

2006

Power & Delicacy, TAI Gallery, Santa Fe, NM Hin: The Quiet Beauty of Japanese Bamboo Art, Grinnell College, Iowa Hin: The Quiet Beauty of Japanese Art, Chicago Cultural Center, IL Exhibited at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA Nara Education Committee Prize, Japan Traditional Craft Arts Exhibition, Kinki region

2007

Masters of Bamboo, Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, CA

2011

The Many Shapes of Bamboo Art V, Oita City Museum

2012

Modern Twist, Bellevue Arts Museum, WA (traveled to12 other venues)

2017

Japanese Bamboo Art: The Abbey Collection, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

COL LEC TIONS Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY Minneapolis Institute of Art, MN Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, CA Sakai City Museum, Japan Craft Arts Hall, Shiga, Japan

TANIOKA AIKO 1947

Born in Chiba Prefecture, Japan

1985

Apprenticed with Tanabe Chikuunsai III for 15 years

2000

Admitted to International Craft Exhibition at Itami

2002

The Next Generation, University of Arkansas, Little Rock

Chairman’s Prize, Sakai City Exhibition Osaka Education Committee Prize, Japan Traditional Craft Arts Exhibition, Kinki region 2003

Chairman’s Prize, Shinbi Craft Arts Exhibition

2004

Hiramatsu Prize, Osaka Craft Arts Exhibition

2005

Weavers of Wonder, Naples Museum, FL Sakai City Mayor’s Prize, Sakai City Exhibition Nara Education Committee Prize, Japan Traditional Craft Arts Exhibition, Kinki region

2006

Hin: The Quiet Beauty of Japanese Art, Grinnell College, IA Hin: The Quiet Beauty of Japanese Art, Chicago Cultural Center, IL

2008

Admitted to Japan Traditional Craft Arts Exhibition

2010

A Different Sensitivity: Women in Bamboo Art, TAI Gallery, Santa Fe, NM Three-person exhibition, Kizan Gallery, Tokyo

2011

The Many Shapes of Bamboo Art V, Oita City Museum

2012

Modern Twist, Bellevue Arts Museum, WA (traveled to 12 other venues)

2016

Discovering Japanese Bamboo Art: The Rusty & Ann Harrison Collection, Herron School of Art & Design, Indianapolis, IN

COL LEC TIONS Minneapolis Institute of Art, MN Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, CA

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