Cross Cultural Series 2 Clay

Join us at the Museum of International Folk Art for a demonstration and dialogue featuring Japanese ceramicist Shoshi Watanabe and Kewa potter Thomas Tenorio.

RSVP | Program Included with Museum Admission

Co-hosted by the Museum of International Folk Art and the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in partnership with the Japan Foundation Los Angeles, this program centers on the shared medium of clay. Through demonstrations and dialogue, the artists will demonstrate and explore both the commonalities and differences in their techniques, as well as their respective relationships with the natural environment.

Thomas Tenorio (Kewa/Santo Domingo) has been making pottery for more than 20 years. Thomas felt that the ancient traditional methods of pottery making were dying within his Pueblo, so he was inspired to try and resurrect this long-lived legacy. Thomas taught himself how to make traditional pottery by reading textbooks, conducting one-on-one interviews with other pottery makers, researching and by trial and error.

Thomas teaches pottery making so that anyone wanting to learn the art of working with clay can do so and carry on a long-lived tradition. He gathers all his natural pigments from within Kewa/Santo Domingo Pueblo. He cleans, hand mixes, hand coils, shapes, and often fires his pottery outdoors in the traditional way. On other occasions, he will fire his pottery in a kiln. Thomas has invented his own unique, contemporary style. He adds a contemporary flare of cutouts and new colors to the traditional Kewa/Santo Domingo style. He makes a wide variety of shapes and sizes and he also paints birds and traditional designs with natural pigments found within his Pueblo. He signs his pottery as: Thomas Tenorio, Santo Domingo Pueblo.

Shoshi Watanabe is a Japanese ceramicist and teacher based in Los Angeles. As a high school student in Tokyo, Watanabe first began working with clay and considers his exposure to the culture of ceramics in Japan to have had a considerable influence on the style of his functional work. In 2014, he completed an MFA in ceramics from UCLA, where he now supervises students and maintains a studio. Having lived in Los Angeles for 15 years, and worked closely with mentor Adrian Saxe, his work has gradually come to blend Western and Japanese styles and techniques.

Watanabe draws considerable inspiration from Los Angeles: color palettes, a sense of ease and utility, a diversity of cultures. Some of his most-used glazes are based on 50-year-old glaze recipes from California, passed down by Saxe. California runs deeply through his practice, even as his sense of rhythm and balance, and hand-application of glazes, distinctly recall Japanese traditions. Watanabe sees ceramics as alchemy, in which elements derived from the earth — clay, minerals, and organic materials — are transformed to create artifacts that tie directly to their place of origin.