Artist Bio
Etsuko Ichikawa is a Tokyo-born, Seattle-based artist who works in various mediums including glass, fiber, video and, most recently, sound installation.
Ichikawa describes her work as “a continuing investigation of what lies between the ephemeral and the eternal.” Her works on paper, termed Pyrographs and Aquagraphs, are drawings made using fire and water, capturing and eternalizing the immediacy of a moment. Her Pyrograph works are literally created by painting with fire, using molten glass to burn haunting abstract shapes and lines into heavy-grade paper that can withstand the heat of her medium. This unique process was discovered following her studies with acclaimed glass artist Dale Chihuly at the renowned Pilchuck Glass School in Seattle. Incorporating her knowledge of contemporary glass with her Japanese heritage, Ichikawa’s original pyrograph technique combines action painting with meditative calligraphy that is at once highly dangerous (due to the extreme heat of the molten glass), yet beautifully poetic. The act of drawing itself becomes a performance, a dance with the elements that has taken Ichikawa years to perfect.
To view a video of the artist’s working process, please click here.
Ichikawa’s work has been exhibited internationally, including The Chrysler Museum of Art, The Ueno Royal Museum in Tokyo, Seattle Art Museum, Bellevue Arts Museum, and University of Wyoming Art Museum. She is the recipient of numerous awards including grants from the Pollock Krasner Foundation, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and The National Endowment for the Arts.
Exhibitions
2014Glass Pyrograph on paper, ponyhof artclub contemporary art, Munich, Germany - SOLO
2013
Echo at Satsop, Davidson Galleries, Seattle, WA - SOLO
The Horizontalists, Lawrence Fine Art, East Hampton, NY - GROUP
Paper Unbound: Horiuchi and Beyond, Wing Luke Asian Museum, Seattle, WA - GROUP
2012
Tracing the Light, Waterhouse & Dodd, New York, NY - SOLO
Pyrograph &Aquagraph, TASTE at Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA - SOLO
Spring Exhibition, D'ART Gallery, Hong Kong - GROUP
2011
NACHI - between the eternal and ephemeral, University of Wyoming Art Museum, Laramie, WY - SOLO
Boom & Collapse, SOIL Gallery, Seattle, WA - GROUP
2010
Winter Haiku, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, CA - GROUP
2009
Glass Pyrographs, Randall Scott Gallery, Brooklyn, NY - SOLO
Moment/Memory, Function+Art, Chicago, IL - SOLO
Trace, Randall Scott Gallery, Washington D.C - SOLO
Visions of Eternity, PressItOn Art Gallery, Miami, FL - GROUP
