The Gardiner is thrilled to announce the launch of CLAY, an original in-house restaurant offering seasonal menus of fresh, local fare in collaboration with The Food Dudes.
Ai Weiwei is one of the world’s most influential artists and human rights activists, and one of China’s most formidable critics. Ai Weiwei: Unbroken features a selection of the artist's most iconic ceramics, and marks the international debut of new work. Opens February 28!
Get creative as a family with clay activities on February 17 and 18, including a fun mosaic-making workshop led by a local artist. Admission for visitors 18 and under is free everyday!
The Gardiner Museum is among the few museums in the world focused on ceramics, and is one of the most important specialty museums internationally. It houses approximately 4,000 objects, including European porcelain, ceramics from the Ancient Americas, Chinese porcelain, Japanese porcelain, and contemporary ceramics. Search the collection online!
Everyone can love clay! Become a Friend at one of the world’s great specialty museums and enjoy the benefits, including unlimited admission, invitations to exhibition previews and special events, discounts on lectures and clay classes, and more.
Lobby Display
Today, Japanese clay art is experiencing one of the richest and most diverse periods in its long history. Throughout 2018, three lobby displays, curated by Joan B. Mirviss, an authority on Japanese ceramics and a New York City gallery owner for 40 years, will feature the work of ground-breaking Japanese ceramists who stand on the world stage, boldly asserting their independence, creativity, and technical genius.
Form + Function shows vessels created for use with floral displays or referring, sometimes loosely, to that function. As Japanese ceramics have evolved through the centuries, form has always played the central role in their aesthetics; even vessels created for everyday use display a sophistication of form. Since antiquity, Japanese potters have continued to develop new shapes and techniques that, while based on indigenous regional styles or ancient prototypes, have also drawn from foreign sources, principally from China, Korea, and more recently, the West.
January 12 – April 22 Form + Function
June 7 – September 2 Surface
September 7 – January 13 Female Masters
Presented by
Supported by
Header: Nakamura Takuo (b. 1945), Vessel that is not a Vessel, 2016, Stoneware with kutani-style glazes, Collection of the Gardiner Museum G17.6.1a-b, Photography by Richard Goodbody