In a brief span of time a few decades ago, one Japanese potter set the ceramic scene on fire, and as quickly as a brilliant meteor shooting across a night sky, disappeared. Yet his name and influence still circle the wheel that spins in most potters' studios; his immense impact on contemporary ceramics has yet to, and will likely never, be extinguished.
Shoji Kamoda (1933-1982) is a name known mostly by museum curators, ceramic connoisseurs and quite disappointingly by few else. Yet this is true with most great talent; the general public, content to live with plastic and neon, hardly takes notice of genius and consumes mediocre products with enthusiastic glee. Luckily for Kamoda, he didn't have to die to be noticed. He had great success, and one can only imagine what he could have done if the muses had favored him a bit longer.
Now, however, the Togei Messe Mashiko Gallery, in Mashiko, Tochigi Prefecture, is holding an ambitious retrospective exhibition on Kamoda. The exhibition, which is split into three parts, charts his career. The beginning years, 1959-1969, are the focus of the current "In Pursuit of Clay's Life" exhibition, which runs until Dec. 7.