info@studio-pots.com	Harlequin Gallery
Motoko Wakana Work currently available.
Small decorated bowl (painted signature). Height: 3.6 cm (1.4 inches) Diameter: 6.4 cm (2.5 inches) Price: £10 Small circular dish (painted signature). Height: 1.8 cm (0.7 inches) Diameter: 10.4 cm (4.1 inches) Price: £12	Bowl with painted hawthorn decoration (painted signature). Height: 10.2 cm (4.0 inches) Diameter: 18.0 cm (7.1 inches) Price: £50
Fan-shaped lidded dish with impressed personal seal. Height: 4.1 cm (1.6”) Maximum dimensions: 18.8 cm by 11.9 cm (7.4 inches by 4.7 inches) Price: £75
Motoko Wakana was born in Tokyo in 1962 and graduated from Saitama University in 1985. In the early 1990's Motoko attended Takasaki College of Art and, after graduating from there in 1993 trained and worked in Japan until coming to England in 1999. In Japan she spent three years at the Utatsuyama Craft Workshop in Kanazawa, followed by a similar period at the Oshigahara Workshop and exhibited widely. She came to England in 1999 and spent time working with Clive Bowen, Mary Wondrausch and John Bedding before settling down in St. Ives, Cornwall. Motoko's functional stoneware can perhaps to split into two different styles although with both she combines white and dark clay, as she is fascinated by the contrast. The first of these is her inlay or "mishima" pots. Here impressed patterns are painted with a light coloured slip that is scraped from the high surface areas when hard. Her other work using trailed slip is perhaps more familiar to us and has its origins in her work with Clive Bowen and Mary Wondrausch mentioned above. Motoko was one of the two potters who took part in the East meets West exhibition at the Harlequin Gallery during October 2002 and stayed in this country until returning to Japan in the autumn of 2005. Back in Japan Motoko has continued to pot and examples of this recent work can be seen above.
Other items of Motoko’s work can be found at www.japanese-pots.com	RETURN TO ARTISTS