Kayoko Hoshino 星野 佳世子 CV
Hoshino Kayoko, originally from Kyushu, studied ceramics in Kyoto with her husband, noted ceramicist Hoshino Satoru, before settling in their hillside home overlooking Lake Biwa in nearby Shiga. Reflecting her impressions of the mountainous landscape, her works often exhibit a monumentality and sense of timelessness, with an aesthetic reminiscent of ancient traditions. Comprising an unusual blend of white and red clays, most predominantly of the coarse, pebbly Shigaraki variety traditionally meant for unglazed earthenware, Hoshino’s grey sculptural vessels come across as a natural synthesis of the expansiveness and monumentality of the mountains and rugged landscapes that have inspired them. Linear depressions created by straw and metal tools pattern the surface, punctuated by silvery mineral crystals that are formed during high-temperature firing. An applied reflective silver glaze further accentuates curves and surfaces.
While often guided by the forms the artist keeps in mind from her walks in the nearby forests and mountains, Hoshino’s works are dynamic and process-driven. The clay is primary in her work, rather than the artist’s preconceived notions or ideas. Led by the clay, the resulting forms are typically an attempt at capturing the movement and beauty of the complex curves and dramatic angles formed during the kneading process. While working with the clay, the artist’s hands might uncover hidden forms and structures that set the tone and tenor for the work, with the final form, like the decisive moment in photography, a culmination, and realization of the essence and potentiality of the clay, given effective expression.
Stretched wire is used to slice the clay, creating Möbius-strip structures seemingly made of stone. Traversing their surfaces maps an unbroken line in a continuous flow of motion with no beginning nor end, evoking a sense of infinity and eternity as fundamental to the universe as cosmic and oceanic vortices. Time leaves its imprint: after some years, the silver surface on the exterior may tarnish, while the silver coating on the inside stays lustrous. These works spur the meditative contemplation of existence and the space-time continuum, the center of which lies a pristine, primordial void. Hoshino’s career came into focus when she won the Grand Prix at the Asahi Modern Craft Exhibition (1997). Her works have been exhibited internationally, and have been collected by prominent institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Boston Museum of Fine Arts (USA), Princess of National Museum of Ceramics and Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Netherlands), and the National Museums in Berlin (Germany).
