Form takes central focus in many technical art forms. The form of porcelain, for example, is so strongly connected to a historical development that to consider interrupting the purity of the medium might be seen to compromise the value of a work. However, contemporary adaptations of such media often allows us to go beyond what we see, and explore works in light of different contexts. The work of Kenji Uranishi moves freely within the juncture of the past and present of a particular formal history. Kenji’s formal concerns are based in the history and tradition of Japanese ceramics, but he is also spurred to contribute a perpetual ‘newness’ to this history to highlight its relevance to contemporary art and his own identity. When we encounter Kenji’s work, installation-based groupings of sculptural pieces or functional objects in porcelain, we are instantly engaged in the unfolding of a multitude of contexts. The artist’s personal experience of new places and ideas, and reflections upon his cultural or geographical positioning opens the formal nature of ceramics to new interpretations.

Kenji Uranishi is a contemporary Japanese artist. He was born in Nara prefecture near Osaka in 1973, and studied ceramics at Nara College of Fine Arts from 1992-96. Since that time Kenji has built a reputation from his home studio Kenkoubou, and beyond in cities such as Tokyo and Kyoto through exhibitions. The work he makes includes installation and functional objects, and the materials he uses are embedded in the history of Japanese pottery. Porcelain found its way to Japan during the early seventeenth century, when following an invasion of Korea, several potters were brought back to the country. Korean porcelain, with its delicacy and translucency, was entirely new and of immense interest. Potters from China that had migrated to Japan during the mid-1600s also brought their techniques of glazing and decoration, and when kaolin was found in the Arita area of Northern Kyushu, the production of porcelain objects in Japan, with both Korean and Chinese influence, flourished. When Japan isolated itself from the West during the Edo period, a specifically unique style was created. The work of contemporary Japanese ceramicists, such as Kenji Uranishi, continues to modify this tradition.

In 2004, Kenji embarked upon a journey to Australia to pursue personal and artistic horizons, and experience living and working in another country. This has spurred the artist to consider the many facets of his cultural identity and new experiences he will encounter in Australia. He says that “Japanese life, social interactions, housing and even food are influenced by a long and rich history. While China has played a major role in Japanese history and culture, Australia’s connection with Japan is very recent. Comparatively, this provides an environment for more objective study of my own country and culture, as well as an element of freedom from historical and cultural constraints... I’m also interested in how these experiences will encourage some self-discovery and provide me with a new perspective on my relationship with Japanese culture.”

In Australia, Kenji has been based in Queensland (Brisbane), and has affiliated his work with Fusions Gallery. His work has been exhibited at Fusions, Craft Queensland and Fox Galleries, and he has undertaken a residency with the ceramics department of Southbank TAFE.

During his early career, about a decade ago, Kenji predominantly used stoneware clays. He turned to porcelain in about 2003, and has leaned more towards porcelain since working in Queensland to explore its unique qualities. A mix of stoneware and porcelain are used for his functional objects. Kenji’s first exhibition in Here & There, was shown at Fusions Gallery alongside the work of well-known and respected Sydney-based artist Mitsuo Shoji [1]. The exhibition was negotiated with Fusions while Kenji was still in Japan and opened during his first week in the country. The work Flow was installed in the space, comprised of individual clay objects reminiscent of small rustic vehicles or cotton-wheels traversing around and towards a small house structure. At its opening, guests busily moved around the room, crouching to investigate the delicate pieces, while others carefully skirted around the installation so as to not accidentally disrupt the minute and yet expansive unfolding of the work. In our interaction with this work, we can imagine shrinking to fit with the setting, to move amongst the tiny objects and see ourselves as one of these pieces on a journey through the crowd. In this way, the work becomes more personal, about ourselves, and the negotiation of our immediate surroundings, our homes, cities, and beyond. The notions of cultural and geographical time and space in Here & There integrally relate to Kenji’s embarkment upon a new and complex range of issues in his decision to work in Queensland, as Mitsuo had also decided about Sydney almost three decades ago.

Delicately small teacups, lidded boxes and milk jugs form part of Kenji’s practice of making functional objects. He troubles the exquisite surfaces of these objects by creating sparse incisions (inlay) in the material and filling these with colour, in a way making reference to the 'laid back' style of Japanese ceramics as opposed to the rigour and distanced perfection of Chinese ceramics and the English adaptations. The colours of blue, pink, green and yellow in these works are not sharp, but strong in another sense. People who pick up his objects first appreciate the exquisite form and smoothness of the surface, then often unknowingly, search them over to find these inlaid areas, each motif slightly different and reminiscent of something in the world - reminding one perhaps of a bird’s feather, a twig, or a cloud. In an exhibition context, seen as groups of objects rather than individual functional pieces, these works take on an installation form [2]. This aspect connects the two sides of Kenji’s work, making the relationship between his works not so much about function and non-function, but two prongs of the same idea, bringing forth the ways in which we encounter things and discover about an object more than first meets the eye.

(Left) Ventilation, handbuilt porcelain with inlay, 2005. (Right) Flow (detail), installation of approx 500 porcelain pieces, handbuilt, 2004;

Oscillating between and within Kenji’s works is the question of what creates a single work or an installation. The artist’s works do not simply gain meaning through repetition, despite the multiplicity of parts we encounter, sometimes within a single work [3]. On the contrary, repetition allows us to relate to the complex workings of a single object amongst the crowd, as well as the group’s single identity. Kenji’s first solo exhibition Float at Fox Galleries in Brisbane, displayed the new work Cloud, an installation piece composed of many, almost architectural, objects cutting diagonally across the space as a single entity. This floor work was flanked by several other smaller objects on plinths and wall-mounted works [4]. Rather than the usual technique of slip casting, Kenji created the porcelain works in this exhibition using a slab technique and embellished the surfaces with coloured strokes of inlay. Each object asserted its own presence through shadows within the angular crevices of the works themselves, and within the installation, with one object shadowing the next.

The gallery’s lighting refracting from each of the wall-mounted Air Wheels in the exhibition appeared to emanate from within the central void of these circular prisms. Like the shadow of a cloud, something that cannot be permanent, the play of light in the works was not literal, but suggestive, allowing one to consider the artist’s statement on these works: “As if a knife had softly carved through a pocket of compressed air, they came to be and if you looked away, even for a moment, they may no longer exist, at least not in the same form”. Light was incorporated into Kenji’s first venture into porcelain in Japan in 2003, and the effect of light bouncing off and between the objects in Float reference this earlier time in his work. For Float, the artist also embraced some studio ‘accidents’, and exhibited three contracted objects that had shrunk in the kiln. He says that the “curved and more angular shapes weren’t the result of intensive consideration, merely the outcome of the organic making process and the creation of shadows.”

Kenji Uranishi’s production of work in Queensland in the short amount of time he has spent living there has been prolific. As he busily creates his works, he is influenced by many factors, such as personal narratives, his observations of the people around him and how they interact with his works. Kenji’s positioning as a contemporary Japanese ceramicist working in Australia does not conjure notions of the oppositions of ‘past and present’ or ‘here and there’, but through the artist’s form of ceramics rather allows for the creation of a new and exciting context in between. This will undoubtedly assist in the personal discovery that he aspires for himself and his work.

1 Here & There, Fusions Gallery, Brisbane, October-November 2004
2 A grouping of Kenji’s functional objects were exhibited at the Craft Queensland exhibition Tea Party, April 2005
3 For more on this topic see Glen R. Brown, Multiplicity, Ambivalence and Ceramic Installation Art, Ceramics: Art and Perception [Issue 54, December 2003] pp.3-8.
4 ‘Float: An Exhibition of Contemporary Ceramics by Kenji Uranishi’, Fox Galleries, Brisbane, April 2005.

Donna McColm is Brisbane-based arts worker and writer, who is currently undertaking post-graduate studies in the field of Art History & Theory