Barry Friedman, Ltd., New York, acquired directly from the artist
Private collection, New York
Acquired from the above
Tom and Karen Guarriello, Connecticut
Acquired from the above by the present owner
"Venezia Aperto Vetro 1998: International New Glass,” Palazzo Ducale, Venice, October 16, 1998-January 16, 1999
"Yoichi Ohira: A Phenomenon in Glass: A Retrospective Exhibition," Barry Friedman Ltd., New York, September 19-November 9, 2002
Rosa Barovier Mentasti, William Warmus and Suzanne Frantz, Yoichi Ohira: A Phenomenon in Glass, New York, 2002, illustrated pp. 141, 376
Barry Friedman, Janet Koplos and Jean-Luc Olivié, et al., Venice. 3 Visions in Glass: Cristiano Bianchin, Yoichi Ohira, Laura de Santillana, New York, 2009, illustrated pp. 191, 430
Japanese • 1946
Glass art – hard, fragile, cold and often heavy – is not typically designed to be handled. Yoichi Ohira's luminous blown glass vessels, however, offer an exception to this trend. They are small and light enough to be turned in one's hands like a Wunderkammer specimen, inviting the viewer to admire his abstracted design vocabulary of gemstones, polished ivory, veined rocks, shimmering water, agate, moss and lichens. Ohira has been compared to Emile Gallé for his ability to emulate the natural world in glass. Comparisons may also be drawn to Jean Dunand's bronze vessels, Japanese rokusho patina and Otto Natzler's volcanic glazes – an impressive range of media to be translated into glass.
Yoichi Ohira graduated from the Kuwasawa Design School, Tokyo in 1969. Shortly thereafter he took up a glassblowing apprenticeship at the Kagami Crystal Company, Ltd. In 1973 Ohira moved to Venice to study at the Accademia di Belle Arti; he graduated in 1978 earning the highest possible grade for his thesis, "The Aesthetics of Glass." In the late 1980s Ohira began collaborating with Murano glassmakers, earning the "Premio Selezione" of the Premio Murano in 1987.
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