Handmade For Japan’s mission is to raise money through an online auction on March 24-27 for relief efforts to assist the victims of Japan’s catastrophic earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear emissions.
In Kasama and Mashiko, centers of ceramic production that are about halfway between Tokyo and Sendai, potters were hard hit by the quake when brick kilns collapsed and years’ worth of production shattered in minutes. Moved by the desire to support their fellow artists, three enterprising women in the United States have organized Handmade for Japan, an online auction of handmade work donated by Japanese artists and American artists with ties to Japan.
Ayumi Horie, a Japanese-American potter who lives in Hudson, N.Y., recruited her friends Kathryn Pombriant Manzella and Ai Kanazawa Cheung to solicit donations and set up the auction, while the illustrator David Gordon designed a logo overnight. Offers of support, in-kind donations and handmade goods have poured in via Twitter, Facebook and e-mail. And artists including the illustrator Lisa Congdon, the textile designer Kaoru Oka and the ceramists Jun Kaneko, Justin Rothshank, Kathy Erteman and Diana Fayt, to name a few, have contributed paintings, shawls and, of course, pottery. The auction will go live on eBay on March 24 and will run through March 27. Through GlobalGiving, 100 percent of the auction proceeds will support relief efforts in Japan. To see more, check out Handmade for Japan’s Facebook page and Twitter feed.
read more of this NY times article here.
