Her life has passed between art and highly competitive sports, with notable breaks that she has dedicated to that other demanding job that is being a mother. Marisa Matsuda Matayoshi studied industrial design at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru and since she was at La Unión school she became a fan of softball, a sport that she does not stray away from, after having competed at a professional level and having represented the national team. .
After being a player, she continued in the Peruvian Softball Sports Federation (FDPS) as a leader, managing to develop a sport that has grown a lot in recent years, including its participation in the Lima 2019 Pan American Games . In her studio, between bats and balls, Marisa keeps another of her great interests: ceramics, which led her to study this art in Japan.
“I think my interest in ceramics comes from my mother. When I was six years old, we traveled to Okinawa and what I remember most is the red earth, the visits to ceramic workshops and shops,” he said in an interview . His university training was complemented by the private workshops of Nanay Valdivia, one of his teachers, and he later obtained a scholarship at the Okinawa University of Art. In 2004, after having gone through the workshops of MOA and Haide San Martín, he started his own workshop.
Other culinary arts
“I started making ceramics as a hobby that was somewhat profitable,” says Marisa, who remembers that her husband was starting the project of setting up a Japanese restaurant and that she joined in to design the tableware. It was then that orders began to arrive for shoyu containers, ramen bowls, teapots, sushi plates and other vessels that he makes using the Japanese technique of nerikomi, which consists of painting the earth before modeling it or turning it to the wheel.
Now it serves restaurants of all kinds, including the very popular Peruvian cebicherias, and also makes large cups, or mugs, and even some innovative vessels to place incense and scare away mosquitoes in summer. “In the restaurants we see the decoration, the colors of the tables and we work on it together with the owners. They are handmade pieces that bear my signature,” says Marisa in her studio, accompanied by softball trophies.
When she opened her workshop she worked alone, now she has an operator and a temporary one depending on orders. It is still a small place, but during the pandemic it was possible to dedicate more to ceramics because sports activities were suspended. Today, when softball once again takes her away from the place where she makes vases and other large pieces, she remembers one of the experiences that led her to mix her two passions.
A sporting art
Marisa has taken home the federation office, where in addition to documents and other memories of the participation of the team in which she has participated even in her master category (up to the age of 44), she keeps one of her most precious memories: a ceramic softball that itself has been hand painted. It is one of the pieces that were exhibited in December of last year, at the Art & Softball exhibition “Carreras 2020” .
The event was organized by the federation, with the support of more than 25 Peruvian artists (including Elliot Tupac, Marcelo Wong and the Nikkei Haroldo Higa, Andrés Makishi, Daniela Matsuda, Diego Lau Toyosato, Junko Azama, Margarita Hishikawa and herself Marisa) who creatively intervened, bats, balls and 'homes' in support of this sport with an exhibition-sale that was held virtually. The objective was to raise funds for the development of softball at the national level, through decentralized schools for younger children.
The piece “Frida, I'm going to you”, made of ceramic and acrylic, painted with markers, is an example of the way in which Marisa shapes her ideals, which includes the development of softball, equality for women and create new opportunities through sport. “We have not stopped training, we monitor them from home and they have recently returned to in-person practices.” One phrase sums up Marisa's passion: “I'm not going to be able to leave softball,” she adds, while talking about new sports projects.
Combined projects
Marisa Matsuda is starting a non-governmental organization to develop softball and support the Peruvian federation, while preparing the new website for her ceramics workshop. The “Art & Softball” exhibition took her back to 2005, when she had her last individual exhibition. “Having exhibited with friends and having combined sport and art in one was another reason to reinvent myself here in the workshop,” he says, while preparing vases and other pieces for his new catalog.
This will reflect its Nikkei style, a mixture of Peruvian motifs and Japanese technique, always using dyed white clay. “Most of the pieces in our workshop are turned one by one.” This year, Peru will organize the U18 Women's Softball World Cup – WBSC, from August 28 to September 5, and Marisa will be present not only in the organization but also with her beloved exhibition, which will have a space in the Sports Complex of Villa María del Triunfo. And there are still many projects to shape.
Facebook: Marisa Matsuda - Ceramics
Javier García Wong-Kit
