Toshiko Takaezu

Born: 1922, Pepeekeo, Hawaii

Toshiko Takaezu made functional wheel-thrown vessels early in her career. Later she switched to abstract vessel inspired sculptures with freely applied poured and painted glazes. In the early 1970s, when she did ...
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Typical Marks

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    Biography

    Toshiko Takaezu made functional wheel-thrown vessels early in her career. Later she switched to abstract vessel inspired sculptures with freely applied poured and painted glazes. In the early 1970s, when she did nothave access to a kiln, she painted on canvas.

    Takaezu incorporates hand built techniques in order to overcome the restrictions of the wheel and to form the closed vessels for which she is best known. Takaezu was at the vanguard of an artistic revolution that elevated ceramics from a craft to an art.

    An interview with Toshiko Takaezu conducted June 16, 2003, by Gerry Williams, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America is available at: http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/interviews/oral-history-interview-toshiko-takaezu-12097.

    "
    Apprenticeships & Residencies
    Primary Work Experience
    1967
    -
    1992

    Faculty, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey

    Other

    Public Collections

    Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover, Massachusetts

    Allentown Art Museum, Allentown, Pennsylvania

    Arizona State University Art Museum, Tempe, Arizona

    Baltimore Museum, Baltimore, Maryland

    Bloomsburg University, Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania

    Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio

    Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, Ohio

    Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

    Currier Museum of Art, Manchester, New Hampshire

    Delaware Art Center, Wilmington, Delaware

    Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, Michigan

    Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, New York

    Frances Y. Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York

    Hunterdon Art Museum, Clinton, New Jersey

    Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton, New Jersey

    Hawaii State Art Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii

    High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia

    Honolulu Museum of Art, Honolulu, Hawaii

    Kresge Art Museum Michigan, East Lansing, Michigan

    Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles, California

    Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, New York

    Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

    Murray State College, Murray, Kentucky

    Museum of Arts and Design, New York, New York

    Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts

    New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, New Jersey

    National Museum, Bangkok, Thailand

    Newark Museum of Art, Newark, New Jersey

    Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

    Racine Art Museum, Racine, Wisconsin

    Ruth Chandler Williamson Gallery, Scripps College, Claremont, California

    Smithsonian American Art Museum, Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C.

    Southern Highland Craft Guild, Asheville, North Carolina

    Springfield Museum, Springfield, Missouri

    Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, Ohio

    Trout Art Gallery, Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania

    University Art Museum, Albany, New York

    University of Hawaii, Hilo, Hawaii

    Utah State College, Logan, Utah

    University of Northern Illinois, DeKalb, Illinois

    Zanesville Museum of Art, Zanesville, Ohio

    Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut

    Bibliography

    Clarke, Joan and Diane Dods. Artists/Hawaii. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press, 1996.

    Haar, Francis and Murray Turnbull. Artists of Hawaii, vol. 2. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press, 1977.

    Takaezu, Toshiko. "Portfolio." Bamboo Ridge Journal of Hawaii Literature and Arts, Spring 1996.

    _______, Toshiko. Toshiko Takaezu: Four Decades. Montclair, NJ: Montclair Art Museum, 1989.

    Yake, J. Stanley. Toshiko Takaezu, The Earth in Bloom. Albany, NY: MEAM Pub. Co., 2005.

    CV or Resume

    Website(s)
    Tags (related topics)

    Scripps College Ceramic Annual

    22nd Ceramic National, Purchase Prize

    Everson Museum of Art

    Princeton, New Jersey

    Citation: Toshiko Takaezu, "The Marks Project."
    Last modified April 29, 2026. https://www.themarksproject.org/artists/toshiko-takaezu-0

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