On Saturday 3rd June 2017 Goldmark will be welcoming the next generation of Mashiko potters in a major exhibition organised by Ken Matsuzaki and with official support from the Japanese Embassy. Five of the finest up-and-coming makers representing the town – Taketoshi Ito, Shikamaru Takeshita, Toshihiko Takeda, Natsu Nishiyama, and Yoshinori Hagiwara – will be gracing the gallery upper floor with their work, the first cultural exchange of its kind between Mashiko artists and a UK gallery. The potters will be flying over from Japan to join us for the day on Saturday 3rd June and sushi, sake and Japanese lager will be served.
In its simple, direct, and unpretentious approach to work, the success of Mashiko lies in its remarkable ability to do away with divisions between genres: here art, craft and design become one and the same, blurred and blended in the studio production of beautiful, supremely functional, contemplative and contemporary objects. Ceramics remains its lifeblood; the town lives and breathes its processes, sometimes literally so, as when the climbing noborigama kilns are lit and the upward draft of air through flame throbs a steady pulse, inhalation and exhalation, like the beating heart of the town itself.