IRON ON IRON

From the moment I first saw a photo of this chawan, I was just drawn to the direct and playful nature of the bowl. The form is simple, honest and appealing but the addition of the tessha like iron glaze, almost calligraphic in nature is just fun, playful, exuberant that fits in the hand and blends function and poetry as effortlessly as a bird takes flight. Neither large nor small, this bowl has a strong form with just the slightest amount of unevenness around the lip while terminating in a kodai that is practical and sturdy showing off the softly textured clay that the pot was thrown from.     

From my perspective, this iron glazed chawan is a classic extension of the Kyoto aesthetic blended with an inexhaustible sense of exploration and experimentation regarding the use and potential for iron in glazes. The creativity of Shimizu is not only easy to witness in this chawan but in the majority of his work over five decades of working in clay. Though this is an older work, this chawan, expressed with the use of iron on iron, demonstrates an insight and understanding into iron as paint together with the skillful choice of clay and form as canvas to bring life out of a handful of natural materials now manifest as an object that stands the test of time and appears to have had a good time while doing so.

WARP SPEED

I showed this bowl to a friend a while back and his first comment was, "warp speed ahead" as it reminded him of any number of sci-fi movies where the spaceship is moving quickly through space and passing by countless stars. After he made the comment I could clearly see how he interpreted the surface interior also simulating just a hint of the expanding universe. As for the bowl itself, this is a bowl I have made quite a few of over the years, sometimes sake cups, condiment bowls, teabowls, what have you thrown out of various clays though this one is stoneware with indented lobes. The pot is base glazed in temmoku and then dipped in a wood ash glaze and as it runs it leaves this rather defining golden brown lip which I think adds quite a nice effect to the piece. I think at the end of the day, I really don't care what you see but that in looking it brings up some memory, experience or your own allusion and that being the case, I have done the best that I could.

KONDO KOHIKI

Old, antique and honest spring to mind as I look at this kohiki chawan. I see the origins of Korean pottery rooted in the very soil and surface of this chawan and in fact the work of much of the pottery made by Kondo Saeki. The bowl form is unpretentious, practical and eminently functional for tea ceremony or an evening meal yet there is a hint of subtle and sequestered nobility that is like an aroma surrounding the bowl. The surface is old, desiccated even but full of movement and life down to the fractured and crackled slip covering the iron rich clay to the alkaline appearance of the glaze that pools and runs to create a rich blue green tint that is pleasant to the eye and adds to the overall aesthetic of simplicity balanced with complexity.    

Kondo Saeki has dedicated his creation to explore slipware and has mastered this style of kohiki ware as passed along to him by his master, potter and scholar, Koyama Fujio. Kondo opened his own studio and kiln in the mid-70s, Haruzawa-gama in Mizunami, Gifu Prefecture where he has challenged himself to create fine works inspired by and dedicated to his master (Koyama) that show the classicism of modern Japanese wood fired kohiki ware. This particular chawan has a richness and complexity of surface that has sprung from the simplest of techniques; throw a bowl, dip it in slip and then glaze and fire it, which kind of reminds me at its core of Sen (no) Rikyu's explanation of the tea ceremony, "first you boil water and then you make tea and drink it".

GBNF II

Though now and again I write or post up pots that I have not handled, when all things being equal I would prefer to have handled the piece so that I have a better sense of how the piece presents itself in hand. This illustrated Oni-Shino chawan by Tsukigata Nahiko is a piece that spanned both scenarios, for quite some time I was only able to see the bowl by various photos sent to me by the owner but over time the owner decided to sell the pot and I was able to study the piece in hand.   

The picture I am using was taken by the original owner and the following is how I described the chawan several years back;  "Large, Momoyama inspired, Shino chawan by the master potter and legendary personality; Tsukigata Nahiko (1923-2006). Though it is easy to spot some influences of his master, Arakawa Toyozo, this chawan is all Tsukigata Nahiko. The vivid iron slip shows, like a shadow, under the feldspar Shino glaze with rich areas of natural green glassy ash coating the surface and iron accents about the lip and showing through the surface. There are also frosty white areas on the face of the bowl where Tsukigata resisted the iron slip to create an evocative spring like pattern of flowers. The classic bowl form is completed with the potter's signature kodai and bold, impressionistic signature."  

As you can see this is a pretty good description of this Oni-Shino bowl though in retrospect I think I would have called attention to the semi-lustrous nature of some of the iron that has perculated out through the feldspatic glaze as well as the perpetually wet appearance that gives the chawan a rather appealing overall appearance. Part of the wetness of the surface comes from a coating of natural ash that built up and melted across some of the piece including around the lip which helps high light that area. All in all a rather enjoyable chawan to have around if only for a brief while and though it is a cliche I use all too often, thanks to all the pictures I was provided and that I took in situ, "gone but not forgotten".

SQUARED OCTAGON

I would like to say I could take full credit for the idea behind this form but admittedly I did not invent the square nor the square pot and the faceting, mentori concept owes just a bit to my time working with Kohyama Yasuhisa. I have posted pictures of this bowl as greenware and as green ware, the fired kind so that the idea is easier to see as the glaze is both highly reflective and hides some of the details that I would like to be a bit more obvious. The first step was to throw and square up the bowl, the ink was used to divide the bowl into quarters though not of any geometric perfection. I then "bellied" out the center of each plane just a bit and then faceted each of planes into two sections creating something akin to a squared octagon. Instead of just pulling the wire, I used a slight sawing motion to create a bit of texture which is a trick learned from my time in Japan. Once the faceting was complete, I set about cutting the foot into a square with a deep spiral in the center after which the bowl was bisque and glazed in a Kuro-Oribe surface which was a bit difficult to photograph. I made a similar piece in my sandy porcelain that though bisque has not been glazed and fired yet, I am hoping that the details show up just a bit better due to the whiteness of the clay and we will see with a Friday firing planned.

TYPICAL

With each unique encounter with a chawan by Kakurezaki Ryuichi in person or in photo, I seem to end up with a thought; is this typical, atypical or in fact is there any such thing as typical for this potter?  While I realize this particular chawan has a formula as to how it is made, cut and manipulated, each one does have certain unique qualities in its appearance and impact on the viewer. Proportions, posture and cut planes outline the form establishing its volume and presence where the various other details add to the narrative contained in what the potter has left of the clay. I guess the question can and should be posed in a different manner; what is typical and does it apply to someone like Kakurezaki Ryuichi? Know for all the conventions and constraints that he has broken, Kakurezaki has added more than a single page in the history book of what is the Bizen tradition. Typical or not, this potter's voice resonates through his engagement in process along with the discovery of where series plus formula leads and that perhaps is enough of an answer for me.    

"Have no fear of perfection, you will never reach it."  Salvador Dali

FLASHBACK FRIDAY

I'll start by admitting when I first saw this mizusashi I wasn't quite sure who made it though the single picture provided was dark and slightly out of focus. As soon as the pot arrived, several Fridays back, based just on the ash (and perhaps the signed box) it was quite evident this was an old Iga mizusashi by Kojima Kenji. Since there was no bio in the wood box I am guessing that this pot was likely fired in the mid-80s showing a pot almost more akin to his Bizen apprentice roots in terms of form than the more classic Iga archetypes that he navigates and adds to in later years.   

What is immediately obvious is that this pot is well fired and though not battle scarred it certainly did wage war with fire and wood now forever attested to on the well fired surface. The lid fits the pot well and has a generous knob that makes the piece function without issue and there is just enough movement in the form to keep the pot from being too stiff and lifeless. The throwing has created just the right amount of articulation that when combined with the ash surface bring a spark of life to the pot that just asks to be impressed into service. I think that this flashback Friday Iga mizusashi clearly is a step forward in the evolution of Kojima Kenji's vocabulary of forms and firing srategies that used pots just like this one to get where they are today.

PLAY A BIT

For good or bad I have been playing with a number of thrown, altered and assembled forms and recently found myself with some "spare parts" so I decided to go ahead, play a bit and resurrect a form I hadn't made in some time, a shovel or spade pot, some of which I have made in the past were rather good size, this one, not so much. With a cut off ring of clay, a small slab or two and a couple of small cylinders I set about getting to work before the pieces ended up too dry to manipulate and pushed the larger ring and small cylinder oval, I cut the base of the oval and attached first the slab and then the pedestal which I also pierced with a square on opposing sides. last but not least I attached a ring lugs to either side and there you have it, a simple spade form ready to have incised decoration on either side. As is probably evident this didn't take much time to build and I have to think it was a better use of the time than the energy necessary to ultimately reclaim the too dry scrap. Not sure what I will do with this but if I can't figure it out there always is the fallback position of Oribe or the Kuro-Oribe, either may be just the right choice.

DESTINATION

How do you define simplicity? I think if you are to fall back on the old adage, a picture is worth a thousand words than it is quite possible that this is your picture. This is neither my photo or my pot, this was sent to me by a friend with an eye for just the right pot as is pretty clear in this detail shot of the kodai of a Hagi chawan by Miwa Kyuwa. I certainly will not say this foot is perfunctory but I will say that it has been stream lined to exclude anything other than the barest of necessities, a modest pedestal on which the bowl can securely rest with the aesthetic considerations that the foot compliments and matches with the bowl form and glaze. To this end this kodai checks off all the boxes and is exactly what is needed and expected from a bowl that is the epitome of simplicity and complexity at the very same time. I guess this is the destination after a lifetime of experience and making pots.   

BEAR TRACKS

I think it would be safe to say that as you survey the work of Kumano Kuroemon that the work is bold, masculine, adventurous and spontaneous from the use of clay to the use and application of glazes, not to mention his near herculean firings. Illustrated is a detail of an older Kumano vase, probably made in the 90s that shows off all of these attributes and includes a casual "bear track" where he held the pot while glazing it just adding to the immediacy of the process which once fired is readily recognizable. This particular vase is over a foot tall and the form is rough and imbued with a sense of having just happened, fresh off the wheel, the application of glaze though well practiced shows a casual, off handed quality where control and precision are missing from his vocabulary or rather he has just decided to throw those particular page out. Covered over in a thick feldspathic Shino glaze, Kumano's handprint acted as a resist when more glaze was applied and later during the firing just the right amount of ash helped further paint the surface and accentuate the bear track as the thin glaze was coated in a natural accumulation creating a brown and sometimes crusty texture. As Kumano fires his kiln with a dedicated intensity the surface is also covered in running green ash as well as pools of green glass filling the nocks and crannies across the surface of the vase. Though this is a simple, singular detail shot of this Kumano Kuroemon vase I think it is safe to say that this is exactly the type of bear track most pottery collectors wouldn't mind encountering.