Study On The Origin And Artistic Characteristics Of Wayne Higby’s Raku Landscape Bowls

Wayne Higby is one of the most innovative potters in American contemporary ceramics. His representative works“Raku Landscape Bowls” are a classic pottery reference of this period. Higby had interest in Chinese traditional culture during all his career which influenced his ceramic works. He was committed to ceramic culture exchanges between China and United States.The Raku Landscape Bowls combine ceramic matter and spirit successfully, and express the image of infinite space in a limited form. This art experimentation had a far-reaching impact on Chinese and American contemporary ceramic art. His Raku Landscape Bowls had emerged in the 1970 s, developed throughout the 80 s and the early 90 s. The creative process enabled Higby to gain rich experience and creative awareness of space in vessel.This thesis is about the origin and artistic characteristics of Wayne Higby’s Raku Landscape Bowls based on the analysis of different periods representative works. With great imagination and creativity, he combine painting, sculpture, raku and vessel in the bowls. The study also discusses the aesthetic composition of those Raku Landscape Bowls. As Wayne Higby said "My bowls are for space", there is a profound meaning behind it.