Hitomi Hosono’s “The White Garden”
By Gabrielle Tse
Installation view of HITOMI HOSONO’s "The White Garden," at The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 2025. Courtesy The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh; and Adrian Sassoon, London.
Hitomi Hosono
The White Garden
The Scottish Gallery
Edinburgh
Feb 6–Mar 1, 2025
Lit from an angle by Edinburgh’s afternoon sun, the delicate ceramics in “The White Garden,” Hitomi Hosono’s recent exhibition at The Scottish Gallery, looked otherworldly. Straddling the boundary between homeware and sculpture, the mid-career artist’s porcelain bowls, boxes, and vases sprout lush thickets of flora crafted with magnifying-glass precision. Though the ceramic sculptures vary in size—ranging from palm-sized to 41.5 centimeters in height—they all carry the distinctive charm of the miniature, drawing our eyes in with their exacting detail.
Although this was Hosono’s first solo show in Scotland, works by the London-based Japanese ceramicist already reside in several major institutions, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, the British Museum, Scotland’s own Aberdeen Art Gallery, and New York’s Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. From 2017 to 2018, Hosono was Wedgwood’s inaugural artist-in-residence, crafting specially designed ceramicware in soft blush hues for the British luxury homeware brand. Blurring the distinction between art and craft, Hosono’s creations blend seamlessly within a domestic setting. The artist has often made connections between her artistic practice and a personal sense of home. In a 2021 interview with the European Fine Art Foundation (TEFAF), Hosono reminisced about her grandfather, a tiling artist whose ceramic tiles filled their family house: “It felt like we were living in his work of art.”
HITOMI HOSONO, A Kaze, Ume and Shira-Yuki-Geshi Bowl, 2021, hand-built porcelain with an interior of dancing sprigs, 16 × 25 cm. Courtesy The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh; and Adrian Sassoon, London.
In Hosono’s universe, interiors and exteriors intermingle; there is a sense that an unruly garden has infiltrated a staid domestic living space. Her botanical motifs do not simply coexist side by side; they pile atop one another, competing to emerge onto the surface, with flowers overflowing from vases and leaves spilling into narrow crevices. In A Kaze, Ume and Shira-Yuki-Geshi Bowl (2021), elaborate clusters of snow poppies and plum blossoms erupt from ornate swirls. The work resembles a lavish wedding cake yet also evokes a coral reef—multifaceted, spirited, and alive.
HITOMI HOSONO, A Wisteria and Hawthorn Leaves Bottle, 2022, hand-built porcelain with an interior of dancing sprigs, 13.5 × 10.5 cm. Courtesy The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh; and Adrian Sassoon, London.
Equally enchanting is A Small Michikusa and English Daisy Bowl (2021), a sculpture that stands a mere 11.5 centimeters tall. Porcelain grass tumbles in every direction, spreading exuberantly across the bowl’s surface. It feels as though Hosono scooped up a slice of earth and shaped it into a bowl while somehow preserving its luxuriant vegetation. At the center sits a many-petaled daisy enshrouded by leafy walls. Placed on a pedestal, the work invites viewers to walk in circles around it, discovering new details at each turn.
“I do not try to copy nature, I aim to extract the essence of nature,” Hosono has said. “The White Garden” closed as snowdrop flowers and cherry blossoms began to appear on the streets. Coinciding with the return of spring, Hosono’s works were on view in Edinburgh at the perfect moment, reflecting the vigor and simplicity of the natural world.
Gabrielle Tse is a writer and poet based in Edinburgh. Her debut pamphlet Rustlings was published by Verve Poetry Press in March 2025.
