Mishima Kimiyo

Born 1932, Osaka, Japan

MISHIMA KIMIYO is one of the most prominent and widely exhibited woman sculptural ceramists. For the past forty years, her work has been shown at museums throughout the world. Like many women clay artists, she began as a painter. In her work, clay became the canvas for silk-screen and transfer renderings of “breakable printed matter”—discarded newspapers, magazines, cardboard boxes and posters. More recently, she has honed her techniques and enlarged her perspective to create monuments to popular culture, focusing on the theme of printed information and wastefulness in a comical, political, and critical fashion. Ever sensitive to the current state of the environment and the overwhelming flow of information in today’s world, Mishima hopes that her work will compel viewers to take notice and even action.

In 2021, Mishima Kimiyo was awarded Japan Ceramic Society's prestigious Gold Prize in recognition of lifetime achievement.

Selected Public Collections:

Ariana Museum, Geneva, Switzerland
Art Institute of Chicago, IL
Ashiya City Museum of Art and History, Japan
Asian Cultural Council, New York, NY
Benesse Art Site Naoshima, Japan
Contemporary Art Museum ISE, Japan
Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, NY
First National Bank of Chicago, IL
Hakodate Museum of Modern Art, Japan
Hamada Children's Museum of Art, Japan
HAP Pottery, China
Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Hokkaido Prefectural Museum of Modern Art, Sapporo, Japan
Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art, Kobe, Japan
Ikeda Museum of 20th Century Art, Shizuoka, Japan
Institute of Contemporary Art, Seoul, South Korea
International Ceramics Studio, Kecskemét, Hungary
International Museum of Ceramics, Faenza, Italy
Iwaki City Art Museum, Japan
Japan Foundation, Tokyo, Japan
Japanese Culture Center, Rome, Italy
Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, NE
Keramion Foundation, Frechen, Germany
Korean Culture & Arts Foundation, Seoul, South Korea
Kunst Gesellschaft Spiez, Switzerland
Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art, Japan
M+, Hong Kong
Matsumoto City Museum of Art, Nagano, Japan
Minneapolis Institute of Art, MN
Musée Cernuschi, Paris, France
Museum of Art, Olot, Spain
Museum of Ceramic Art, Hyogo, Japan
Museum of Fine Art, St. Petersburg, FL
Museum of Modern Art, Wakayama, Japan
Museum of Modern Ceramic Art, Gifu, Japan
National Museum of Art, Osaka, Japan
National Museum of History, Taipei, Taiwan
National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Japan
Ôhara Museum of Art, Kurashiki, Japan
Okegawa City Park, Japan
Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art, Gainesville, FL
Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park, Japan
Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, MA
Takamatsu City Museum of Art, Japan
Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, Japan
Vehbi Koç Foundation, ARTER, Istanbul, Turkey
Worcester Art Museum, MA
Yamaguchi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan