Takuya Yokoyama’s works possess a rich impression of their materiality, while they confer an overwhelming sense of presence through the process of their molding within which traces of the artist’s hand may be felt. There is a delicate impression to the white works, a powerful strength and shine to the black works, and a nonchalant bearing to the green works. Colour, texture and form resonate together within Yokoyama’s pieces, and each one appears as if created in the exact state as it supposed to be existed.
The artist does not make works by gradually approaching to the piece’s ideal form, but by creating them as if he is following the guidance of the material itself. The word ‘techne’ in the exhibition’s title is the Greek word for ‘technology’, and points to the notion of humanity discovering truth within nature, and the consequent revelation of technology. Yokoyama’s ceramics function similar to ‘techne’ :whilst working with the clay little by little, the medium’s characteristic motion becomes visible. As the artist ‘assists’ in response to that, the form of the work runs alongside his actions and develops with the original intention of the clay. It is an act not of controlling or ruling over the clay, but of working together with the material to extract what is already within. This is the essential nature of Yokoyama’s porcelain-making process. Through a practice wrought through his continuous motions and the medium, Yokoyama expresses what he describes as “something close to performance or dance, but more realistic, with a sports-like component to it”.
The ‘Pots’ of this exhibition bear magnificence to them, seeming as if taken from their concealment within the vastness of nature in their rounded form as they already were. With barely 2mm-small hole at its top, the work is at once a pot, but can also be grasped in the sense of an objet from the microscopic size of that hole. Yokoyama is not concerned with a positioning within the category of Arts & Crafts, but instead with opening up the pliability of expression of his materials, and of his own capabilities as an artist.

Takuya Yokoyama was born in Kanagawa Prefecture in 1973, and graduated from Rikkyo University in the Department of Sociology. While a university student, he encountered ceramics through an extra-curricular ceramics club, spent years at Tajimi City Pottery Design and Technical Center after graduated. Today he creates ceramic work in Tajimi city, Gifu prefecture. He has held numerous solo shows to date in Tokyo, Yokohama, Nagoya and Seoul among others. Since exhibiting at TKG Editions in Kyoto in 2013, this will be his second solo exhibition (and his first in three years) with Tomio Koyama Gallery.


Opening reception: 20 July 6pm-8pm　*The artist will be present

Information Provided by: Tomio Koyama Gallery

Period: July 20,2016 (Wed)　〜 August 8,2016 (Mon)
Hours: 11am - 8pm
Closed: Open everyday during the exhibition
Venue: 8/ ART GALLERY/ Tomio Koyama Gallery