Naomi Shioya

Naomi Shioya (Japanese, born 1961), Roof Garden, 2008, cast glass. Gift of David Kaplan and Glenn Ostergaard, 2019.117a-e.

A 1985 graduate of Japan's first glass program at Tama Art University, Naomi Shioya produced colorful blown glass assemblages that were met with early critical acclaim. A turning point in Shioya’s career came when she and her husband moved temporarily to Marseille, France in the early 1990s. There, she was deeply affected by the bleak conditions of displaced Muslim Algerian immigrants and began to feel as if her pursuit of the beautiful in her glass work was in vain. In an effort to sustain a more satisfying and responsive mode of expression, she began to write poetry to help crystallize her ideas. When she took up glass again after a year of writing poetry, she embraced casting rather than blowing as her favored technique.

Inspired by daily life and surrounding objects, Shioya's cast glass sculptures often echo the traditional Japanese tanka or haiku, describing emotions and thoughts through commonplace items such as buildings, doors, chairs, figures, and animals. 

Roof Garden, a poem by Naomi Shioya

We can relax on this roof garden
They aren't here:
Tired wanderers,
Green young men,
Ladies loud talking.
We can relax only here.