Kyoko Shimada, large ceramic bowl with floral decoration and gold and silver background

Japan, Contemporary period

Large, open hemispherical bowl, in ceramic, by Kyoko Shimada, with painted decoration of large flowers and foliage in a range dominated by deep blue, brown, rosy white, and metallic highlights. The outer wall is entirely animated by this ample and free plant decoration, treated with a very pictorial energy. The interior responds to this richness with a geometric decoration in gold and silver, arranged in triangular facets, which captures the light and gives the bowl a very decorative presence.

The shape is wide, stable, very open, with an irregular lip that contributes to the vitality of the piece. What is striking at first is the contrast between the very free movement of the exterior floral decoration and the more structured arrangement of the interior center. This opposition gives the work its balance. The bowl is not only ornamented: it is conceived as a large pictorial volume, where the entire surface becomes a place for the motif to unfold.

The decoration is characteristic of Kyoko Shimada's work, known for her compositions of flowers and plants treated with elegance, freedom, and a sense of color. Japanese sources describe her as an artist born in 1954 in Ibaraki Prefecture, trained at the Tochigi Prefectural Ceramics Guidance Center, active in Mashiko since 1978, and particularly recognized for her decorations of flowers of the four seasons. They also mention her regular exhibitions, notably at Takashimaya Nihonbashi, as well as the publication in 2004 of a book dedicated to her floral motifs.

This large bowl clearly shows what makes her work interesting: a ceramic piece very structured in its form, but carried by a free, almost textile-like painting in places, which gives the flowers and foliage a remarkable decorative amplitude. The deep blue, the light reserves, and the gold and silver accents give the piece a strong presence, immediately legible in an interior.

The bowl does not have a box.

Dimensions: height 30 cm; diameter 47 cm.