Chawan Cabinet unfolds through an environment that evokes a quiet, domestic Japanese landscape: intimate, tactile, and serene. Objects are not merely presented; they are situated within a continuum of rituals, inviting a slower gaze and a more contemplative encounter. The space encourages pause, close looking, the consideration of material, and the imagination of the histories, labor, skill and mastery, embedded within each piece. This attitude is already declared at the store’s threshold, where a single object, displayed in the window, frames a moment of focus and suspension from the surrounding urban flow.

Inside, the atmosphere shifts toward a dense material presence and a sense of quiet introspection. Ceramic floor tiles, developed by Theaster Gates in collaboration with Mizuno Seitoen Lab, a Tokoname-based Japanese ceramics manufacturing company, ground the space, while the walls, finished in a raw, earthen plaster inspired by vernacular Japanese techniques, introduce a tactile, almost primordial quality. Together, these elements define an environment that feels in deliberate contrast with the polished neutrality of conventional retail.

The spatial composition is pared back, articulated through a few precise gestures. At its center, a long table in reclaimed wood, echoing the working surfaces of Gates’ Chicago studios, serves as both display and site of exchange. Along one side, a modular metal shelving system hosts a stratified accumulation of bjects, evoking memory as a process of layering and sedimentation. At the center of the modular unit, a green niche showcases pieces from the Prada Home collection, made in Japan.

The arrangement resists hierarchy and order, dissolving the rigid taxonomies of retail display in favor of something more intuitive, more human, where imperfection and irregularity become part of the composition.

To the right, a sequence of more intimate rooms unfolds. The first is anchored by a cabinet from Gates’ personal collection, a symbolic presence that encapsulates his ongoing reflection on storage, memory, and domesticity, and lends its name to the project. With shelves lined with chawan from Gates’ 1,000 tea bowl project — a project devoted to the replication of form and the chemical experimentation of glaze formulas — expressive gradients on the surfaces of the chawan lend a contemporary reflection on the vessel, whose ritual form has been perfected by artisans across generations. Beyond it, a more restrained shelving system, crafted in Japan, continues the dialogue between artisanal tradition and formal clarity.

Set within the inner courtyard, a tea house introduces a further layer of meaning. Inspired by the principles of Japanese architecture, beginning with the tatami module and extending to the use of authentic, carefully sourced materials, it offers a space of ritual and ceremony. Here, traditional tea ceremonies led by a Japanese tea master take place as offerings and invitations rather than representations. The surrounding garden, composed of gravel, carefully placed vegetation, and sculptural vessels by Gates, extends this atmosphere into an exterior landscape of serene contemplation.

A final, subtle layer is introduced through sound. A vintage turntable, placed within the space, plays throughout the day. This element, too, requires care: staff are invited to engage with it as they would in a home. Gates, deeply attuned to the relationship between sound and spatial perception, privileges the analog warmth of vinyl: its tonal depth, its slight imperfections, its capacity to render atmosphere.

Theaster Gates is an artist whose practice finds roots in conceptual formalism, sculpture, space theory, land art, and performance. Trained as both a sculptor and an urban planner, through his work, Gates contends with the notion of Black space as a formal exercise, defined by collective desire, artistic agency, and the tactics of a pragmatist.

Gates’ relationship with clay has been a focal point of his practice since studying pottery in Tokoname, Japan, in 2004. For Gates, clay is a metaphor for his ability to shape his world, extending the intelligence of the hand to the mind. Recent vessels extend Gates’s celebration of clay and craft, linking conceptual practices to physical making. Clay’s plasticity offers Gates the ability to move across time periods and cultural influences in his search for nuanced forms and to return to simple forms – to receptacles that he can place within the context of contemporary art – and to a rediscovery of the generational potency of craft.

Gates has exhibited widely, including solo exhibitions at Smart Museum of Art, Chicago (2025); Albuquerque Foundation, Sintra, Portugal (2025); Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2024); Contemporary Art Museum Houston (2024); LUMA Foundation, Arles (2024 and 2023); New Museum, New York (2022); Serpentine Pavilion, London (2022); Frederick Kiesler Foundation, Vienna, (2022); Whitechapel Gallery, London (2021); Victoria & Albert Museum, London (2021); TANK Shanghai (2021); Prada Rhong Zhai, Shanghai (2021); Spelman College Museum of Fine Art, Atlanta (2020); Tate Liverpool, UK (2020); Haus der Kunst, Munich (2019); Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2019); Martin Gropius Bau, Berlin (2019); Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2019); Fondazione Prada, Milan (2018); Kunstmuseum Basel (2018); Sprengel Museum, Hannover (2018); National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (2017); Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto (2016); Fondazione Prada, Milan (2016); Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria (2016); Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2013); Whitechapel Gallery, London (2013); Seattle Art Museum, Washington, DC (2011); Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2011); Milwaukee Art Museum, Wisconsin (2010); and St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri (2010).

Gates is the recipient of numerous awards and honorary degrees including the MOCA Legend Award (2025); Guggenheim Fellowship (2025); 39th World Cultural Council Award (2024); Isamu Noguchi Award (2023); Friedrich Kiesler Prize for Architecture and Art (2021); the Royal Institute of British Architects (2021); the World Economic Forum Crystal Award (2020); J.C. Nichols Prize for Visionaries in Urban Development (2018); Nasher Sculpture Prize (2018); Sprengel Museum Kurt Schwitters Prize (2017); and Artes Mundi 6 prize (2015). He was the visiting artist in residence at the American Academy in Rome (2020); and was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2021.