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Tag: Nakaya Yoshitaka

ENTOTEN’s first-ever brick-and-mortar gallery soft opens in San Diego

By:
Ai Kanazawa
July 5, 2018Topics

Entoten Gallery Closed in May 2020

July 2018 is a super-exciting month for ENTOTEN because after 6 years of being an online gallery, I just moved into an office suite in San Diego for the first time with a small physical gallery and space to hold workshops.

The new office is inside a business park next to the Amtrak coaster track. It is in an area called Bay Ho in San Diego, just east of Interstate 5 and across from Pacific Beach. It is also close to the new trolley line which took 30 years to get approved and will be up and running by 2021. Unfortunately, there is no stop in front of the gallery.

ENTOTEN’s new office (Address is 4907 Morena Blvd. Ste 1402, San Diego, CA 92117) is right by the coaster train tracks. There are also poles being built to accommodate the mid-coast trolley line expected to operate in 2021.

Sure, a beautiful gallery right on the beach or some fashionable retail district would have been ideal, but over the years, I became convinced that location is secondary to the importance of having an opportunity to show the beautiful work in person.

Cherry wood coffee scoops by Maeda Mitsuru in the ENTOTEN gallery. Over the last 6 years, Maeda-san has gradually revised and improved its shape. Next to it is a robot soldier card stand that my nephew gave me as a present after he visited Ghibli museum almost 5 years ago. “This is for you when you open your gallery,” he said. So here it is.

I learned this lesson by visiting numerous galleries in Japan, that are sometimes very small and not in the most convenient of locations. During the visits to these galleries, what stuck with me was the beauty of the items that the owners selected to display and the interesting conversations that I had with them. I hope that I’ll be able to create a unique space where we can share our interest and love for beautiful craft in San Diego.

“Eye opening” of the Tamashima daruma paper doll from Okayama prefcture. An eye is drawn to make a wish. I filled it with the hope to learn to see better, in reference to the “just look now” phrase that Yanagi Muneyoshi wrote to urge people to look at common handmade objects with fresh eyes and to discover beauty in our daily lives. 今見ヨ イツ見ルモ ima miyo itsu mirumo. The other eye is only drawn when the wish comes true.

The other benefit of my office location is that visitors will be able to park without the stress of finding a spot in car-crazy Southern California. And who doesn’t love watching the trains go by?

For July, I will soft open the gallery every Wednesday (July 11th, 18th and 25th) from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and on other weekdays and Saturdays by appointment only. I will focus my display items to things made of wood.  If you have specific pieces in my online shop that you would like to see, please notify me prior to your visit so that I can have them out for you.

I’m also planning on having a weekend ceramics event in August when I receive long awaited ceramic works by Hanako Nakazato, who is back in Maine! So stay tuned. In the mean time, please don’t hesitate to reach out and contact me at hello@entoten.com

ENTOTEN Gallery
4907 Morena Blvd. Suite 1402,
San Diego, CA 92117

Current Gallery Hours->

Click to see map->

Wood vessels by Nakaya Yoshitaka: The Legacy of a Tree

By:
Ai Kanazawa
October 19, 2017Wood Nakaya Yoshitaka

Woodwork by Nakaya Yoshitaka in our shop ->

Woodworker Nakaya Yoshitaka resides in the sprawling foothills of Mt. Fuji in Shizuoka prefecture. Much of the wood he uses is obtained locally, often from families that needed to fell trees on their properties for safety or other reasons.

These trees often have significant meaning for the homeowners because their ancestors may have planted them or they may have played on them when they were children. Nakaya-san feels that by making vessels out of this wood, he is ensuring that the legacy of these trees live on.

Chestnut plate by woodworker Nakaya Yoshitaka
Japanese oak bowl by Nakaya Yoshitaka

Nakaya-san’s wood vessels are shaped before the wood is completely dry and allowed to shrink and warp to provide their distinctive curves. The foot is created after the wood is thoroughly dried to make a leveled bottom. By creating vessels in this way, Nakaya-san thinks that he is letting the wood to speak, and decide the shape that it wants to be.

Wood Artist Nakaya Yoshitaka: Chronicling the Lives of Trees in His Work

By:
Ai Kanazawa
January 8, 2013Wood Nakaya Yoshitaka

Woodwork by Nakaya Yoshitaka in our shop ->

‘Organic’ and ‘precise’ are two words that usually do not go hand-in-hand, but they were the adjectives that immediately came to mind when I first saw the exquisite work of Japanese wood artist Nakaya Yoshitaka.

Footed square plates by Nakaya Yoshitaka

His footed square plates are examples of stunning construction and clean lines. The natural rings of the wood create a beautiful contour map and it does not take long to notice how much careful planning goes into his work.

Such meticulousness is not surprising from an engineer-turned artist. Nakaya-san started out studying mechanical engineering at the prestigious Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto. “After graduating from university, I worked as a mechanical engineer drafting plans everyday. When I worked there, I had this vague but insistent feeling that this was not the career for me. I then remembered how I enjoyed building and making experimental machines at university, far more than executing the actual experiments.”

Wood artist Nakaya Yoshitaka working on a lathe at his studio.
Photo courtesy of Nakaya Yoshitaka

When Nakaya-san realized how much he enjoyed making things by hand, the daily routine of drafting plans at the office became unbearable. So the engineer left his drafting job 12 years ago and went to work for a furniture maker in Takayama.

View of Mt. Fuji from Nakaya Yoshitaka’s studio in Fujinomiya city

In 2009, Nakaya-san moved his young family to Fujinomiya city at the foot of Mt. Fuji and set up his own studio, which specializes in wood products. “I had no hesitation in choosing wood as my principal working material because I spent many happy hours in the mountains and rivers as a child” he says.

He thinks that the most difficult aspect about working with wood is that its shape can change depending on the environment. He cleverly uses his insightful perspectives on such nature of wood to his advantage.

Wild cherry bowls by Nakaya Yoshitaka

Take for instance the wild cherry bowls that Studio Kotokoto is offering. The bowls are shaped before the wood is dried and are left to warp as they dry naturally to form their unique shape. These bowls are then finished off through careful refining that is a signature of Nakaya-san’s work.

Nakaya-san has recently been focusing on using local trees that were toppled during typhoons or by silvicultural tree felling. “I hope to let the forests thrive even as I utilize the wood for my work”, he explains.

Nakaya-san carving texture onto the foot of a cherry bowl
Photo Courtesy of Nakaya Yoshitaka

This deep love for wood comes through in the prominence that Nakaya-san gives to the natural beauty of wood rings, which transforms his bowls, plates and other products into dazzling organic and utilitarian works of originality. His work is an inspiring tribute to the grace and splendor of trees.

 

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