PUBLIC OPENING
In Search of the Perfect: Vessels by Ipek Kotan
Gerald Garston: The Joy of Color
Saturday, 21 January 2023
3:00 PM to 6:00 PM
240 Newbury Street, 3rd Floor
Please join us Saturday, 21 January for the Public Opening of Gerald Garston: the Joy of Color and In Search of the Perfect: Vessels by Ipek Kotan; Ipek Kotan will be in attendance. The exhibition will take place 21 January through 5 March.
Ipek Kotan was born in Istanbul, Turkey in 1977 and studied media arts with an emphasis on photography at Emerson College in Boston, MA. She later attended Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in Providence, RI and completed her foundation studies in which she explored drawing, painting, ceramics, and metalsmithing. In 2008, she moved to the UK and received her master’s in ceramics from Staffordshire University in Stoke-on-Trent. In 2010, she established her own studio practice.
Public collections representing Ipek Kotan’s works include the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in the Netherlands, and Staatliche Kunstammlungen Dresden and Museen der Stadt Landshut in Germany. Kotan received commissions from Cartier and Barneys New York, and her works are represented in over 250 private and public collections and museums worldwide. She was the only artist to complete a year-long residency at the European Ceramic Work Centre, now also known as sundaymorning@ekwc, a residency whose past residents include artists such as Anish Kapoor, Antony Gormley and Betty Woodman.
Kotan's work has been reviewed by renowned ceramic art critic Walter Lokau, former Christie’s senior director and interior designer Richard Rabel, published in art publications such as Ceramic Review, New Ceramics, Art Aurea and popular magazines such as Harper’s Bazaar and Elle Decor. Kotan has previously lived in Turkey, the United States, Indonesia, England, Austria, and Switzerland, and is currently based in Leiden, the Netherlands.
Gerald Garston (1925-1994) was born in Waterbury, Connecticut. A graduate of Johns Hopkins University, Garston was also a student of Karl Metzler, Louis Boucher, and Josef Albers. In Garston’s own words, Albers “exerted the greatest influence” on Garston, and his color theories can be found throughout Garston’s works. Garston taught Albers’ class Interaction of Color, based off of his book of the same name, for many years at the Creative Arts Center in New Haven, Connecticut and Paier College in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
Garston's work is included in the permanent collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the DeCordova Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum, the Rose Museum, and the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University.