Over the years I must say I have seen and handled a lot of
pieces by Furutani Michio including on several trip to Japan and his studio.
Admittedly, I suspect there are a number of people who have handled more but I
have encountered enough to make a fair assessment of his better work. Given my
experience with his pottery specifically, I often wonder, of all these really
good and great pieces, what would or does make for a museum piece? In all this
time, I have come up with a personal criterion that revolves around several key
areas; how is the form articulated, what personal attributes by way of design
elements and marks does he add to the pot, how does the piece build on the
tradition of Shigaraki or Iga and potentially the rendering of some well-known
utsushimono? Added to these factors, I find myself judging the surface and
firing as a means to further communicate an ideal as well as present a
landscape that narrates both the historical and modern context of the work.
Last but not least, trying as best to compare apples to apples, where does it
fit within other of the potter’s works for form and surface as well as within
the overall contemporary examples of the tradition? Seems easy enough, well to
be honest though this is subject to the greater degree, striving for
objectivity makes this a less than straightforward proposition.
As
for one of the pots by Furutani Michio that make my museum mentis meae*, this
classical Ko-Iga mizusashi is well up at the top of the list. Despite the fact
that I have seen a number of his pots that could easily be in any museum, this
Furutani Michio mizusashi stands out for a wide array of reasons chief among
them is the fullness of its character where posture, animation and its stoic
presence convey a hint of a “dark side” to this essential vessel. In his
pursuit of this form, Furutani Michio has sought out an innate sense of
antiquity and modernity, perfectly balanced where there is nothing superfluous,
allowing the form and sparse marks and physical elements do all the talking/
communicating. The final keystone to this level of pot is the exceptional
firing where the balance of just the right amount of ash works well to
accentuate but not obscure any post throwing work allowing for the marks to
further articulate the pot and give voice to the individual nature of this
potter’s expression. All of these considerations and decisions along the way
are based on study and years of experience which is why I consider this pot to
be among the absolute top level of his work appears simple and effortless but a
lifetime of making goes into each and every pot.
One last observation regarding
utsushimono, roughly translated as copies (of historic archetypes), like his
contemporaries, Furutani Michio studied the classics and learned about forms
and construction of coiling and coil & throwing based on these older pieces
along with the historical perspective and its modern relevance. There are great
challenges involved when making modern interpretations of the archetypes,
capturing the essence of the originals is a prerequisite and no easy task.
Careful observations and considerations go into these pots but it is also quite
essential that the uniqueness, the idiosyncrasies of the modern potter be
evident in each pot, one’s own voice within the spectrum of the tradition
moving a pot from a mere copy and pushing “the good” to being so much more.
”It is an unscrupulous intellect that does not pay to
antiquity its due reverence.” (Desiderius)
Erasmus
(*This picture contains an actual image of a pot or pots in an AI generated background or scenario)
.JPG)