Itsuko Shida

This large unomi or teabowl has a sticker on the base as shown and a faint impressed mark (at 10 o'clock) on the image. I think the impressed mark is the same as the sticker but difficult to see with the naked eye even. It appears to be salt glazed. Any ideas please?

It might well have come from the Harlequin Gallery back in the 1990s. It's by a female Japanese potter called Itsuko Shida, who came over here to do a degree originally at Camberwell and then at Harrow.

The impressed mark will be as the label.

Around 2007/8 Itsuko starts to make hand built work in the style below: -

A close up of one of these small bowls and her seal mark applied on laminated paper to the base.



Note: the bottom 2 images expand if clicked on.

Later she did go back to ceramics, making hand-built stylised animal sculptures.


This Donkey Head dates from 2008.

Itsuko was a young Japanese female studying for a degree in Ceramics in London when I became acquainted with her in the late 20th century. Initially she was at Camberwell College of Arts but transferred to the degree course at Harrow (Univ. of Westminster), as that had considerable more ceramic content and also much practical content too.

She gained her degree in the early part of this century and stay here, married and had children. Unfortunately, she had give up her ceramic career because of health problems that made the work difficult and painful.

I sold her work through the Harlequin Gallery back in those days and here is a set of small bowls that she made in 1999.

A close up of one of these small bowls and her seal mark applied on laminated paper to the base.

Here's a photo of Itsuko taken at the Harlequin Gallery in London 1999.