WebinART: In Search of the Perfect: Vessels by Ipek Kotan

Virtual event hosted by Pucker Gallery.

Join us 23 January at 1PM for a conversation with Pucker Gallery artist Ipek Kotan, Emeritus Alan J. Dworsky Curator of Chinese Art and Emeritus Head of the Department of Asian Art at the Harvard Art Museums, Robert Mowry, and Gallery Director Bernie Pucker.

This event will be an opportunity to explore Ipek's singular journey in clay to develop a personal visual language in her search for the "perfect".  
The exhibition In Search of the Perfect: Vessels by Ipek Kotan will be on view at Pucker Gallery from 21 January through 5 March 2023.

Ipek Kotan was born in Istanbul, Turkey in 1977, and studied media arts with emphasis on photography at Emerson College in Boston, USA. After some years working as an entrepreneur and in the corporate world, she could no longer deny the urge to work with her hands and returned to university full-time to study art and design. She attended Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in Providence, USA and completed her foundation studies where she explored drawing, painting, ceramics, and metalsmithing. But it was ceramics in general and sculptural vessels in particular that resonated with her deeply. In 2008 Kotan moved to Stoke-on-Trent, UK – the “motherland” of studio pottery and received her master’s in ceramics from Staffordshire University in Stoke-on-Trent, UK.

In 2010 she established her own studio practice and since then has been working full time as a ceramic artist exhibiting her works in Europe and the United States. Public collections representing her works include the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Rotterdam, Netherlands), Staatliche Kunstammlungen Dresden (Dresden, Germany), Museen der Stadt Landshut – Rudolf Strasser Collection (Landshut, Germany) and the Presidential Art Collection (Ankara, Turkey). Kotan was the first and 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 Gormly, Betty Woodman and Tony Cragg. Her work has been reviewed by ceramic art critic Dr. Walter Lokau, former Christie’s senior director and specialist Richard Rabel, published in art publications such as Ceramic Review, New Ceramics, Art Aurea and popular magazines such as Harper’s Bazaar.

Ipek’s work is represented by Adrian Sassoon in London and Christian Liaigre in Paris; two of the world’s leading contemporary art dealers and her work is in over 250 private art collections worldwide.

She has had solo shows in European galleries such as Puls Contemporary Ceramics in Brussels and Beaux Arts in Bath; and have been selected to exhibit in shows such as Revelations in Paris, Meister der Moderne in Munich, SOFA Chicago, Grassimesse in Leipzig, Mons Triennial in Belgium, British Ceramics Biennial in Stoke-on-Trent, UK. She was a finalist in the Westerwald Museum’s Modern Classics competion in Germany and Mino Ceramics Competition in Japan. Her work is currently represented at the Sogo Museum of Art in Yokohama, Japan and in the fall she will be represented by Zetterquist Galleries in New York City during Asia Week.

Ipek is currently based in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Now retired, Robert D. Mowry was for many years the Alan J. Dworsky Curator of Chinese Art and Head of the Department of Asian Art at the Harvard Art Museums and also Senior Lecturer in Chinese and Korean Art in Harvard’s Department of the History of Art and Architecture. A specialist in Chinese art, he has also done considerable work with Korean art, publishing in the field and building a collection of Korean paintings and ceramics for the Harvard Art Museums. Although he majored in European art history, French, and medieval humanities as an undergraduate at the University of Kansas (BA, 1967), with plans to study late medieval architecture and manuscript painting in graduate school, his two years in Korea as a U.S. Peace Corps Volunteer in the late 1960s (1967–1969) sparked an abiding interest in Asian art and culture. He did his graduate work at the University of Kansas, studying with Chu-tsing Li and Laurence Sickman and specializing in Chinese art. As part of his graduate work he spent two years as a curatorial assistant and translator at the National Palace Museum, Taipei, from 1975 until 1977. He spent most of his career at the Harvard Art Museums (formerly known as the Fogg Art Museum), beginning there as an assistant curator in 1977, promoted to associate curator in 1986, and named the first Alan J. Dworsky Curator of Chinese Art in 2000. Taking a break from Harvard, he served as the founding Curator of the Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller 3rd Collection at The Asia Society in New York from 1980 until 1986. His best-known publication, Hare’s Fur, Tortoiseshell, and Partridge Feathers: Chinese Brown- and Black-Glazed Ceramics, 400–1400, is the catalogue of a 1995 exhibition that pioneered the scholarly study of Chinese brown- and black-glazed ceramics. His 1993 The Chinese Renaissance in Bronze: The Robert H. Clague Collection of Later Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900 remains the primary introductory text on later bronzes, just as his 1997 Worlds Within Worlds: The Richard Rosenblum Collection of Chinese Scholars’ Rocks remains the standard reference on scholars’ rocks. His 2007 A Tradition Redefined: Modern and Contemporary Chinese Ink Paintings from the Chu-tsing Li Collection, 1950–2000 was the first comprehensive study of Chinese ink paintings from the second half of the twentieth century from all parts of the globe, from China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong in the East to the U.S. and Europe in the West. His most recent publication is Peace and Quietude: Song Ceramics from the Qingjingtang Collection, which documents a 2014 exhibition that he organized for Lisbon’s Macau Scientific and Cultural Center, which essentially is Portugal’s national museum of Chinese art. Since his retirement from Harvard in 2013, he has been serving as a Senior Consultant in Chinese and Korean Art at Christie’s; though working primarily with Christie’s New York offices, he also has responsibilities toward the London, Paris, and Hong Kong offices. He’s not involved in sales in marketing; rather, he does research, publishes scholarly articles, gives lectures, consults on individual works of art and whole collections, and conducts continuing-education seminars for the Christie’s professional staff. From 2013 through 2017, he served as the editor of the National Museum of Korea’s scholarly journal, Korean Art and Archaeology.

Bernard Pucker is the director of Pucker Gallery, which he founded with his wife, Sue, on Newbury Street in Boston in 1967. Pucker Gallery represents over fifty artists from around the world, presenting ­­­ approximately ten exhibitions annually, often paired with artist talks, virtual “WebinArts,” and other public events.

Bernie is currently a Board Member at the Japan Society, Boston, and the Jewish Publication Society. He also serves on the Leadership Council for Facing History and Ourselves, as well as the Artistic Advisory Board for the Terezin Music Foundation. Previously, he served as President of Solomon Schechter Day School; President of the Newbury Street League; and a Board Member for the Friends of Copley Square and The Unity Project, among others.

Bernie received his MA in Modern Jewish History from Brandeis University and his BA in History and English Literature from Columbia College.