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Acknowledgments Message from Richard Milgrim Written in 1999 for Milgrim's exhibition catalog celebrating Richard's first 20 years working in Japan As the millennium draws to a close and a new one is about to begin, we are inevitably caught between looking forward and backward at the same time, trying to grasp the significance of this historic milestone and our place in the lineage of time. Personally, it seems my fate has determined that it is time for me to begin the next stage of my life/career to coincide with the opening of the new millennium. While maintaining my home and studio outside Kyoto, beginning in the spring of 2000 I will establish a new home and kiln in America to further my goals of bringing both my family and (my) two countries, America and Japan, closer together through the art of clay, a universal language. This catalogue illustrates the various styles which I have been working in over the past 15 years since establishing my independent studio/kiln outside Kyoto. The actual works pictured herein were almost all made over the past three to four years and selected from two major one-man exhibitions held in the fall of 1999 at the Kyoto and Yokohama Takashimaya Art Galleries, celebrating 20 years making tea ceramics in Japan. I would like to thank all the artisans who have done such an excellent job over these past 20 years creating the various accessories necessary to transform my simple pieces of pottery into elegant tea utensils, from lacquer lids to brocade bags and wooden boxes. Your patience and understanding combined with your various skills have been instrumental in raising the level of "my" finished works. I also wish to thank Mr. Yoshida Kozo for his long-standing interest in my career here in Japan and his tireless enthusiasm and determination to help people everywhere understand the beauty and significance of Japanese ceramics, both classic and contemporary. Most of all though, I must express my sincere gratitude to Dr. Sen Genshitsu, for his unwavering commitment and encouragement over these past 20 years. His enthusiastic endorsement of my work has undoubtedly succeeded in allowing tea practitioners throughout Japan to view my works without prejudice and take pride in including the work of a non-Japanese in their choice of wares to use for tea as something more than just a curiosity. In closing, thanks also go to Omori Tokuaki and Okita Masaji for their work on this catalogue and my very close friend Yamazaki Takahiro for insisting that this book become a reality and overseeing its' production. I would like to offer this collection of my recent works to you as a gift signifying the close of my 20 years working in Japan, with thanks to all of you have followed my career. Please look forward to future exhibitions of my creations which will evolve as I reestablish my roots in America in the years to come.  Richard Milgrim

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Last Update
Nov. 9, 2005

Message from
Richard Milgrim
2005 Exhibit

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