Shio Kusaka

Shio Kusaka was born in 1972 in Japan and currently lives in Los Angeles with her husband Jonas Wood. She received a BFA in 2001 from the University of Washington, Seattle. She moved to Los Angeles after college in 2003 to focus on her studio practices which are predominately in ceramics.  In 2014, Shio was featured in the Whitney Biennial.  Ms. Kusaka is now represented by David Zwirner Gallery.
Kusaka is an important artist in the recent west coast art movement focusing on clay as a medium.  Her work is often simple in form and incorporates patterning, dimpling, drawings etc on the surface.  Her somewhat irregular shapes, but strikingly beautiful surfaces, hold a commanding position in the contemporary art world and one of her vessels recently sold at auction for over $100,000.  

Shio Kusaka has held exhibitions at Gagosian Gallery, Rome, Italy; Shane Campbell Gallery, Chicago; Anton Kern Gallery,  New York; Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, Netherlands;  Modern Institute, Glasgow, Scotland; etc.  Her ceramics vessels are included in numerous contemporary art collections around the world and several prestigious museums.

“Kusaka merges drawing and sculpture, typically moving between abstraction and representation. She has developed a distinct formal language in her use of shape, pattern, color, and glazing techniques that make reference to Yayoi period Japanese pottery, Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt, and the wall drawings of Sol LeWitt alike.”- Blum and Poe Gallery, Los Angeles “If the Minimalist painter Agnes Martin had been a potter, she might have made vessels like these.”-Roberta Smith, New York Times