Yoichi OhiraTHE EXCEPTIONAL Japanese designer Yoichi Ohira (born 1946) worked and livedin Venice for nearly 40 years. Graduating from Tokyo’s Kuwasawa Design School in1969, he apprenticed at the Kagami Crystal Company, Ltd., then worked in fashion.A deep fascination with Venetian glassmaking traditions, prompted by a visit toVenice, led him to complete his studies at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia in 1978 with athesis on the aesthetics of glass. Following his early successes in designing for the storied localglass industry, he set up his own studio practice and collaborated with the most skilled Venetiancraftsmen to execute his intricate sculptural forms. Glass maestros and frequent collaboratorsAndrea Zilio (born 1966), Livio Serena (born 1942), and Giacomo Barbini (born 1951) — thelatter executing the complex surface cutting and carving — were acknowledged by co-signingcompleted works.A thoroughly modern expression in Venetian glass, this ovoid sculptural vessel has its roots inVenetian glassmaking traditions and Japanese design aesthetic. Venetian glass is historicallyknown to be thinly blown, transparent, and often extravagantly hot-sculpted. After World War I,industrial advances in technology and changing consumer taste impelled Venetian glassmakers toexplore the drama of thicker, more boldly colored, and opaque shapes. Ohira harnesses complextraditional techniques like mosaic glass, filigree networks, and colorful inlays (intarsia) intoblown forms distinguished by a restrained Japanese design aesthetic. Cut lenses and window-likepolished panels in his work direct interior views of carefully placed, intricate patterns throughthick transparent glass. Many of his sculptural works are inspired by the specific urban and naturalenvironment of the lagoon city. In his series Calle di Venezia, the artist explores the vertical shapesand changing light encountered in the narrow streets and passages crisscrossing the city. Ohira’sextensive technical knowledge and unique aesthetic sensibility enable him to masterfully capturethe essence of Venice in glass — the opacity of its bricked buildings contrasts with glimpses ofintense transparent color that invoke the stained glass windows of a church or the shimmeringwater of a canal in the distance.24
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