Yoko Kubrick, Contemporary Sculptor
Yoko Kubrick is a Japanese–Czech American sculptor whose work investigates the relationship between material, movement, and transformation. Working in marble, granite, bronze, and stainless steel, she creates abstract forms that move between the bodily and the geological, the intimate and the monumental.
Kubrick was born in Guam and raised across Guam, Hawai‘i, and California, with formative periods spent in Prague. She studied environmental studies and urban design before completing graduate work in psychology and art therapy and pursuing advanced sculpture studies at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Carrara. She subsequently developed her practice in the professional stone-carving ateliers of Pietrasanta, Italy.
Her sculptures are distinguished by sweeping curves, compressed folds, apertures, and interior spaces that make resistant materials appear fluid and alive. Water, geological time, mythology, and the embodied experience of landscape recur throughout the work, but the sculptures remain deliberately open, less representations of fixed subjects than presences encountered physically and spatially.
Kubrick’s work has been presented throughout the historic landscape of Filoli in the solo exhibition Ovid’s Metamorphosis. Her sculpture Tides is permanently installed at the University of San Francisco, and her work has been featured in T: The New York Times Style Magazine, Architectural Digest, Kinfolk, Surface, and Cool Hunting.
Based in Northern California and working internationally, Kubrick develops sculpture for public and institutional sites, architecture, landscape, and private collections.
Artist Statement
My work is inspired by the raw beauty of nature and by forms that feel feminine, sensual, and alive.
The built world is often defined by straight lines, hard surfaces, and geometric forms. I am interested in bringing something different into those spaces, the softness, movement, and irregularity of the natural world. I work with curves and organic forms, often in stone, creating a contrast between the permanence and weight of the material and the softness of the forms themselves.
Nature is a recurring source, especially water, tides, erosion, growth, and changing landscapes. Classical and comparative mythology is another current in the work, most visibly in Ovid’s Metamorphosis, her 2023 exhibition at Filoli inspired by Ovid’s Metamorphoses. These stories are points of departure rather than subjects to illustrate. Some works begin with myth; others begin with material, landscape, or the character of a site. The finished sculptures remain abstract and open to the viewer.
Ultimately, I want the sculptures to bring some of the raw beauty of the natural world back into the places we build.
Biography
Before continuing her practice in Italy, Kubrick studied stone carving, worked as a sculptor’s assistant, and developed an independent studio practice at San Francisco’s Hunters Point Shipyard.
Her background in environmental studies, urban design, psychology, and art therapy informs what she calls the “emotive language of form”: the way curves, openings, mass, and void can be felt before they are explained. Her practice as an abstract marble sculptor developed through advanced study in Carrara and continued work with the specialist ateliers of Pietrasanta.
Education
- B.A. in Environmental Studies and Urban Design, San José State University
- M.A. in Psychology and Art Therapy, Notre Dame de Namur University
- Graduate-level sculpture study, Accademia di Belle Arti di Carrara
“Kubrick, who works primarily in Tuscany, uses the same milky Italian marbles and handwork techniques as her mostly male predecessors…”
Process and Fabrication
Each sculpture begins through drawing and modeling. Kubrick determines the form, scale, material, and surface, directing its development from the first model through fabrication, engineering, and placement. Monumental works are realized in collaboration with the specialist ateliers, artisans, engineers, and fabricators required by their scale.
Exhibitions, Commissions, and Recognition
In 2019, Kubrick created six works of sculpture for the gardens of Le Petit Trianon at the San Francisco Decorator Showcase, collaborating with Zeterre Landscape Architecture and DZINE. Architectural Digest described her sculptures as a focal point of Zeterre’s classically formed garden.
That same year, Kubrick completed Tides, a monumental Carrara marble sculpture commissioned as a permanent gift to the University of San Francisco. The making of Tides in Pietrasanta was documented in a profile published by T: The New York Times Style Magazine before the sculpture’s permanent installation at the university.
“Yoko Kubrick’s marble works reference familiar tales while subverting the traditions that have defined her discipline.”
In 2020, Kubrick was an Artist Fellow at Vita Brevis Club in San Francisco. In 2023, she presented Ovid’s Metamorphosis, a solo exhibition at Filoli Historic House and Garden.
Kubrick’s work has also been presented at EXPO Chicago and Art Miami with Rosenbaum Contemporary, Palm Beach Modern + Contemporary, and the inaugural Silicon Valley Sculpture exhibition.
Her sculpture is held in private collections in California, Hawaii, New York, Europe, and Asia. She is represented by Pamela Walsh Gallery in Palo Alto, Rosenbaum Contemporary in Palm Beach, and Melissa Morgan Fine Art in Palm Desert.
Kubrick works in Carrara and Calacatta marbles, granite, travertine, bronze, and stainless steel.