Yoshimi Futaruma フタムラヨシミ CV

Yoshimi FUTAMURA is a Nagoya-born, Seto-trained Japanese ceramics artist who has been working and living in France since 1986. Her work has been widely exhibited and is part of many public and private collections, including Musée National des Arts Asiatiques – Guimet (France), Musée de la Céramique d’Andenne (Belgium), Musée Ariana (Switzerland), Brooklyn Museum, New Orleans Museum of Art, and Yale University Art Gallery (USA). 

Futamura’s monumental sculptures seek to channel the power of nature and express the materiality of the earth while reflecting natural kiln effects. A firm believer in the palpable power of ceramics, she is inspired by nature and prehistoric pottery, particularly those from the Jōmon period (c. 14,500–300 BCE), among the world’s oldest-known, which embody a deep connection with nature. Earlier exploratory series include Racines (Roots), Rhizomes, and Vagues de Terre (Earthen Waves).  

The great Japan earthquake and tsunami of 2011 triggered profound shock, rupture and metamorphosis for the Paris-based ceramicist. That the hitherto peaceful country of her birth and cultural heritage could be so defenceless against such destructive forces began shaping Futamura’s work, reflecting a fear of uncertainty and of uncontrollable forces and undercurrents threatening to annihilate everything in their wake. Pieces that came out of firing unexpectedly broken, open, or cracked came to be embraced as “gifts from the kiln” and apt expressions of the forces of nature, and were subsequently developed into the Métamorphose and Black Holes series. The differences in shrinkage of the materials during and after firing result in works with uniquely fissured surfaces that alternately resemble matter undergoing petrification or fossilisation, charred wood, bark, fungi, or lava. Emerging out of the darkness, the Rebirth series arose out of the need to usher in something positive. Encrusted with possibilities, these highly evocative surfaces and forms exemplify what happens when the power of the materials and the energy of nature are unleashed by the trial by fire: putrefaction and rupture, breaking through and ushering forth the prospect of new life.