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John Baymore Solo Exhibition, Thayer Gallery, Ma Feb-Mar 2017


Guest JBaymore

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  • 4 weeks later...

Tantalising.

Thank you so much for sharing.

The pot filled space oozes a calmness , I think only one person should be allowed in this space at a time and the queuing masses be kept right out of it!

Selfish me! But I'd like to stand in that room for hours, thank you.

Babs

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Guest JBaymore

Thanks for the kind words, folks.

 

The rescheduled Artist's Reception is happening tomorrow evening Tuesday, Feb. 14th from 6-8 PM.

 

Hope some of you might be able to make it.  If so, please say "hi".

 

best,

 

.................john

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  • 3 weeks later...

John

I  have just returned from visiting your exhibit at Thayer. I am a fortunate one who lives only a twenty minute drive away and had been looking forward to it.  I have not words to describe it--I went by myself and was the only one in the gallery ( it was around noon) which made it perfect. All I had to do is look and absorb for as long as I chose -- all these beautiful jewels -- the gold lining sure surprised me!  So many looked as though you had just plucked them from the earth as they were growing there! Thank you for the  once in a lifetime opportunity.

sincerely Ginny

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Guest JBaymore

Ginny,

 

Wow.  Thank you VERY much for the kind words on the exhibition.  I'm glad you were able to stop by and see it.

 

Glad you got to do the "solo" visit thing also.  I myself MUCH prefer going to people's exhibitions at times other than the formal "opening".  When there are lots of people around, you cant get the "feel" of the space the way the artist intended the installation to be.  And then there is the "socializing" aspect... that distracts from absorbing from the works.  Getting to see a show alone... is a luxury to be savored.

 

Ah,... yes...... "the gold one"!   That much gold luster is not a common treatment for me.  Tiny touches that you "discover"....yes.  Gold "Trump Plating"....... not so much.  People who formally study Japanese Tea ceremony and who know Japanese cultural history of the development of that tea ceremony will "get" that piece somewhat.  And the title is a dead giveaway for tea people. It is "Ode to Jurakudai". 

 

In the time of Joo and his student Sen No Rikyu, the tea ceremony had developed into an ostentations affair, with opulent displays of wealth and power being put on by the ruling Warlords.  Warlord Hideyoshi represented probably the pinnacle of this trend just prior to the "Grand Tea Ceremony at Kitano' when he moved into his palace in Kyoto, called Jurakudai,  and had a solid gold tearoom installed.  The important teamasters were reacting to this tendency to opulence with a new style of tea that favored more "rustic" and simple tastes, and the idea of "wabi-cha" was being born.  At the "Grand Tea Ceremony at Kitano" in 1587 Hideyoshi's tastes kind of got rebuffed by the tea people (he was not happy)... and tea took a direction to the "wabi-sabi" aesthetic that exists in tea to this day.

 

So that Chawan, plays on this idea.  It is playing a bit of fun with this historical backstory.  The inside is solid bright gold luster.  Ostentatious and flashy.  The outside is a casual, finger-swiped Shino glaze.  A wabi-sabi feeling.  There are tiny little bits of gold luster "hidden" in pinholes in the shino glaze.  The past cannot be totally separated from the future.

 

SO....... that is the story behind that one.

 

And yes... I want people to feel like many of those pieces are "plucked from the earth".  Materiality figures strongly in my work.  Geologic forces at work.  Comes from time spent as a kid camping out in nature and exploring the US southwest.  As an eastern kid.......  seeing the actual structure of the planet under the green carpet of the wet northeast was a revelation. 

 

VERY glad you liked it.  Thanks for making the effort to go.

 

best,

 

...............john

 

PS:  BTW.... Jurakudai is the root of where we got the name "raku" for the Japanese ware of that name.

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