Jackson Li (Li Jian Shen) became the president of and a professor at the San Bao Ceramic Art Institute in Jingdezhen, China after earning both his B.F.A. and M.F.A. from the Institute and a second M.F.A. from the New York State College of Ceramic Arts at Alfred University. Since the early 1990s, Li has held exhibitions and organized ceramics symposia from Shanghai to Amsterdam. He has led workshops at art schools throughout the United States and Canada, most notably the Rhode Island School of Design and Harvard University. He has been instrumental in bridging the ceramics worlds of the East and the West..
Li and Wayne Higby (one of Li’s professors at Alfred) collaborated on a vision of an international ceramic art center located in China that would provide opportunities for the international arts and crafts community to explore and exchange the culture, arts and crafts of China. The Institute was officially inaugurated in June of 2000 and since that time, the international ceramics community has felt its tremendous impact. Symposiums, personalized tours and visits throughout China to areas of specific interest to artists and artisans have been organized. University level ceramic instruction and summer courses have also been established with the Institute playing host to American ceramic students through the NCECA (National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts) scholarship program. It also offers prized residency and fellowship programs, and continues to organize cultural exchange opportunities in China.
For Chinese ceramicists, having very different lines of work is the norm – a production line for market and works that are singular in nature and used as a vehicle for personal expression. Li’s work, his vessels and sculptures, celebrate both the material and culture of his homeland and China’s contribution and place in the rich history of ceramics. His vases, bowls, and tea bowls, all meticulously crafted are surfaced with imagery and pattern rooted in tradition, as are the decorative surface motifs; however, the motifs have been contemporized and updated. His sculptures, created in stoneware are narratives, combined memories of time and place throughout Li’s life deeply rooted in the landscape, history and culture of his native land.
Li breathes life and passion into his works of clay, his works expressing beauty and vulnerability, strength and vigor.
