Koike Shōko 小池 頌子

Born Beijing, China

As one of the first female graduates from the prestigious ceramics department of the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music, KOIKE SHŌKO is among very few women ceramists of her generation to support herself as a studio-artist. In doing so, she has become one of the most recognized ceramists from Japan with works in museum collections throughout the world.

Koike draws inspiration from the sea, creating shell-like forms in Shigaraki stoneware with irregular, undulating, pinched, ruffled edges that protrude from hand-built and wheel-thrown bodies. A creamy white, opaque glaze covers her forms, and the edges are further accentuated with brown iron glaze and sometimes supplemented with metallic, iridescent or turquoise glazes. Recently she has punctuated some of her works with puddling of a translucent azure-blue crystalline glaze nestled between rising pleated petal-like panels.

Selected Public Collections:

Ackland Museum, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, CA
Brooklyn Museum, NY
Cincinnati Art Museum, OH
Cleveland Museum of Art, OH
Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX
Hamilton Art Gallery, Australia
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Minneapolis Institute of Art, MN
Mint Museum, Charlotte, NC
Musée national de céramique, Sèvres, France
Musée national des arts asiatiques - Guimet, Paris, France
Musée Tomo, Tokyo, Japan
Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX
Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka, Japan
National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, Japan
Saint Louis Art Museum, MO
Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park, Japan
Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, MA
Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK