Jun Kaneko

Jun Kaneko was born in Nagoya, Japan in 1942. He studied painting during his adolescence, working in his studio during the day and attending high school in the evening. He came to the United States in 1963 to continue those studies at Chouinard Institute of Art when he encountered sculptural ceramics. He proceeded to study with Peter Voulkos, Paul Soldner, and Jerry Rothman in California during the time now defined as The Contemporary Ceramics Movement in America. The following decade, Kaneko taught at Scripps College, Rhode Island School of Design and Cranbrook Academy of Art.

His artwork appears in numerous international and national solo and group exhibitions annually, and is included in more than eighty museum collections. He has realized over seventy public art commissions and is the recipient of national, state and organization fellowships and honorary doctorates.Kaneko is increasingly drawn to installations that promote civic interaction.

Based in Omaha since 1986 and establishing his current studio there in 1990, Kaneko has worked at several experimental studios as well and he pursued industrial collaborations to realize his largest-scale hand-built sculptures with Omaha Brickworks and Mission Clay Products. In 1998, he and his wife Ree Kaneko formed a non-profit scholarly and presenting organization in Omaha Nebraska called KANEKO dedicated to the exploration of creativity in the arts, sciences and philosophy. For more information please visit www.thekaneko.org and www.junkaneko.com.