Seeming to peer out the window of the gallery is a brightly colored red and blue polka-dot blob. For a moment the amorphous shape looks like it is slowly crawling up the wall, till further inspection suggests that the piece is actually still -- or is it? Such is the work of Japanese ceramic artist Chiho Aono, who seeks to capture movement in high-fire clay forms that have a clear influence from nature and breathe with a life of their own.
"I'm not interested in making static forms," said Aono in an interview with The Japan Times recently. "I want to make work that looks like it is moving with the passage of time, so that the same piece would somehow appear different everyday. I see time as a 'spice' for my artwork."
Works such as her "Verdraenger" series, a German title that translates loosely as "suppression," look as if they are about to burst open from an inherent tension within. Sandwiched between ceramic blocks, these pieces call to mind the genesis of the most basic life forms trying to crawl out from between two rocks. Overall, the geometric foundations custom-designed for each piece on display act as built-in pedestals, but they also provide a sharp contrast between the globular forms and angular bases. Aono's use of vivid colors and vibrant surface patterns curiously does not make her forms seem synthetic, but instead suggest that the viewer has simply encountered a yet undiscovered species.