SUBTLETY

Every pot has its nuances and subtleties but seeing them without the pot in hand can be a major obstacle and this is one of the reasons I have been posting the slideshow videos I make from time to time. For some pieces, even when the pot is right in front of you, those subtleties are masked in shadow and the wrong lighting but thanks to our friend the Sun, occasionally the attributes that bring a piece to life are plain to see. I received this Bizen vase a few weeks back to ID for a collector and after taking quite a few well lit shots, I set the pot over on a shelf to wait for the inevitable light show that happens in the later afternoon and wasn't disappointed. As you can see in the photo a wide array of hi-iro flashes and subtleties are brought out with the sunlight and the vase is painted in a number of colors and tones making for a rather attractive canvas. Made by the later Bizen potter, Masamune Satoru when this pot first arrived and was on a different shelf, my wife referred to it as the hidden vase as it was in a poorly illuminated spot in the house and was like searching for a form in the darkness. I took enough pictures to put together a slideshow video which I will post at some point in the not too distant future.

"Human subtlety will never devise an invention more beautiful, more simple or more direct than does nature because in her inventions, nothing is lacking and nothing is superfluous."  Leonardo da Vinci