PROVING GROUND

A while back I fired a kiln load of pots that included some new slip variations that was intended as something of a proving ground. The previous pots had all been teabowl size and in this firing I included pots from about 10" to 14" tall to make sure the results came out about the same as the scale increased. Illustrated is an Oribe bottle, a bit over 12" tall with thicker raked slip under the glaze creating a rather organic surface on a very controlled bottle form. The slip and surface worked out well on all the pieces with no pinholes and a nice contrast between surface and form. Since I am not often inclined to make pots bigger than about 16" tall finished I put a check in the "worked" column for this particular technique as two water jars and two bottle vases came out pretty close to how I hoped they would and that is always a win in my book.

CAVEAT EMPTOR

I debated whether or not to put up this blog post as I didn't want to seem preachy but after thinking about it for some time, here it is. This started recently when I put up a classic Seto-Guro chawan by Arakawa Toyozo on my Trocadero marketplace a while back with POR (Price On Request) in regards to the price, a piece vetted in Japan by several reputable sources I should add. A number of inquirers asked about the price and admitted it was out of their price range or simply said thank you but two in particular were surprisingly different. The first thought the chawan should be drastically less expensive and the other thought the price positively outlandishly overpriced. This particular inquirer let me know that he had an extensive collection of potters like Kato Tokuro, Hamada Shoji, Kawai Kanjiro, Rosanjin and of course Arakawa Toyozo. In fact he owned two Arakawa chawan and both were bought for less than $1500. Truth be told, I am not a fan of discussing values and prices but in this instance I thought it somewhat important and relevant. I asked him about his pieces and he sent me links to the sites from which they were purchased and I have to admit the pots did not look anything like any Arakawa I have ever seen; making me more than a bit suspicious regarding their apocryphal and questionable origins. In the past couple of years I have seen several Toyozo chawan for sale at just under 4,000,000 yen so how can one expect and honestly believe that they can buy a chawan by one of the most important Japanese potters of the 20th century or any of these top level potters for less than $1500? In the end, I guess it is true, you get what you pay for.

Illustrated is a page/price list from a dealers catalogue for a Shino chawan by Kato Tokuro. I simply picked this piece to showcase how costly pots by the really big potters can sell for. At 12,000,000 yen (roughly $99,000 at todays conversion rate) it is easy to see that great work brings great prices. I guess I won't be buying this chawan any time soon.

LESSON LEARNED III

I have been in the midst of glazing pots for a stoneware/ porcelain firing and took a picture of a chawan freshly glazed, leaving me to wonder if it is a gaggle of geese is it a cluster or conference of chawan? At any rate I started loading the kiln and remembered one of those lessons learned moments and went and mixed up some wadding to put on the feet of most of the pots, especially the teabowls. Years ago I used to have crazy problems losing pots with ash glazes and finally took what I had learned from salt and wood firing and started wadding the pots. The glaze combinations that I tend to use and like are rather runny and since I glaze right up to the point of no return on the feet, better to take every precaution possible and eliminate having to try to grind pots flat and somewhat usable (or creating a larger shard pile). Using Elmer's glue, I attach the wads to the pots and got the kiln loaded and ready to fire. At least in this way I have mitigated one of the myriad of things that can go wrong and bought myself a slight measure of relief.

"Prevention is better than cure."  Goethe

ONE OR THE OTHER

Illustrated is a simple wood fired crackle white glazed bowl with added feet by Randy Johnston made during the mid-1990s. Fully functional in design and execution, Johnston's wood fired pots explore what possibilities arise from falling ash accentuating mark, ridges, lips and shallows and to that end, the interior of this bowl and the lip clearly show the efforts of the firing and potter. Having studied with both Warren MacKenzie and Shimaoka Tatsuzo, this bowl shows the influence of the former while wood firing glazed ware reflects the later, either way it is a reflection of both masters while maintaining its individual voice of a conscious and thoughtful potter.

Cat Stevens; INTO WHITE

ANOTHER SIDE

Illustrated is a detail shot of a stoneware glazed hachi with overglaze painting in red and green enamels. This tray form showcases another side of Kato Kenji who was best known for his Persian blue pottery and as this piece shows he was quite adept at making stoneware pottery and wonderful enamel painting. In fact, Kato Kenji was so well known for these enamel painted hachi that Arakawa Toyozo mentions them in; THE TRADITION AND TECHNIQUE OF MINO POTTERY and one was choosen as part of a traveling exhibition of modern Japanese pottery that toured the United States a number of years ago which included the likes of Arakawa, Tomimoto, Rosanjin, Kawai and Hamada. Though much of his overglaze enamel work is also influenced by the pottery of ancient Persia and the Middle-East, this decoration is purely Japanese in inspiration and execution and I can not help but be impressed by the wispy and quick pace that the design vokes. It is important to see the varying styles of a potter and this hachi shows just one facet in the arsenal of Kato Kenji's pottery from traditional Mino-yaki, Temmoku and Persian influenced pottery and a few surprises in between.

FRESHLY CARVED

Illustrated is a group of carved porcelain bowl that will end up getting a nice clear glaze dip once bisque. Thrown, tooled and then brushed with a very thin black slip, I usually like to wait until the next day after the slip is applied to carve the bowls and I leave the trimmings inside the bowl until they are really dry so that the surface doesn't get scratched up since the slip I use is very thin. Listening to more subdued music, especially classical, I enjoy carving time, it is relaxing and it lets the mind wander; perhaps this is how I end up carving subject matter like flowing grass, the tree of life and lotus patterns. I am reminded as I carve of a saying I saw on a t-shirt years ago; "The best time to relax is when you don't have the time for it." and getting work done and relaxing at the same time is certainly my idea of multi-tasking.

A TRUE CLASSIC

It is rather easy to use the phrase "a classic" when dealing with certain potters but in this case this truly is a classic chawan by Furutani Michio. If you consider the definition of the term classic, serving as a model the best of its kind, this chawan is just that. Look at Furutani's body of work this form is omnipresent and one of only a small handful of forms he used for chawan and among this particular shape and style, this pot stands out. Characterized by the fact that it is not easily definable in terms of time, this chawan is a blend of nobility, serenity and truth; the superfluous as always is stripped away and what is left is the elemental nature of the work of Furutani Michio. This chawan is a true classic and not only in regards to the individual potter but among the expansive history of chawan making and of the long standing Shigaraki tradition.

"But wonder on, till truth makes all things plain." Wm. Shakespeare

TAKEN FOR GRANTED

I'll be the first person to admit that at times it is very easy to take things and people for granted and this is especially true of the amount of effort, skill and labor that goes in to the seemingly simplest of tasks or objects. Over the years I have used a chasen tea whisk to make tea and more often as a prop in a photograph but recently, thanks to a friend I was made aware of the huge diversity, artistry and effort that is necessary to create a whisk of quality. Watching a master at work it is immediately clear that the creation of such a piece is the culmination of those 10,000+ hours needed to allow the hand and eye to work in perfect unity doing what must seem like at times monotonous minutia but in the end this exacting attention to details creates not only an object of function but of art as well. Once you see one being made I doubt you will ever take such a humble object for granted ever again.

The attached Youtube video from THE MAKING series shows the making of powdered green tea and of an artisan creating a complicated and beautiful chasen.

THIS IS A TEST

Every now and again it occurs to me that in a simplistic way, every thing I do in pottery is a test, a step toward what I am trying to achieve and there sure are a lot of test pods, teacups and teabowls that have been broken up to prove it. I think it is not necessarily fair to say that making more pots to get better is a test but rather making more pots to make glazes like what I actually want and see in my mind's eye qualifies quite a few pieces as tests. I was thinking about just this point this morning as I took a wonky, altered teabowl and covered it in a thicker coating of porcelain slip while not being 100% sure the slip will adhere well to the clay body. If I were using my own stoneware and porcelain clay bodies instead of commercially available versions I could be 99% sure of the end results as I had worked that issue out back in the early 1990s but today, it is just a test. Overall the porcelain slip is not terribly thick but in spots it is well over a quarter of an inch and more so I will have to wait and see what the results are out of the bisque and then glaze firings. The truth is that it keeps a potter honest and constantly on his toes not knowing exactly what is going to happen, though repetition is important for production, giving in to ceramic fate, testing will get you where you want to go and if not it can simply be the pathway to another journey.

RARA AVIS

Considering I potter and sell the ocassional pot for a friend or collector it is hard to predict what may come my way. Some pots are simple, functional pieces and every once in a while a real rara avis shows up. A short while back I had to pots by Ningen Kokuho Shimizu Uichi and now a very noble Momoyama influenced Seto-Guro chawan by legendary potter, Arakawa Toyozo. A lot can be said about Arakawa considering he was one of the true giants, pioneers of the 20th century but I'll try to let this short video of the piece tell the story.

If inclined, you can see additional photos of the Arakawa Toyozo chawan over on my Trocadero marketplace;
http://www.trocadero.com/stores/albedo3studio/items/1313561/item1313561store.html