A
week or so ago, I received an email from a collector from the Great White North
letting me know that a photo I had put up actually shows off a guinomi that he
had acquired. The photo in question was actually sent to me by another
collector whom had visited Kumano in Echizen some time past and to be honest, I
thought what are the odds and even more so, what a small world has been created
by internet connectivity. The guinomi is by Kumano Kuroemon and is quite a
beauty, the surface is a sheet of pale green fractured ice with an area of
built up ash running down the very face of the piece. The form is classic
Kumano, broad and well articulated perched on a generous foot that adds both
stability and a sense of purpose to this small giant. At first glance it is
easy to see what Kumano's surfaces are all about but as you delve deeper in to
them, they are a complex assortment of varying effects, chemistry and
fantastical firing. It may only be a guinomi but from my perspective, a truly
good pot can fill up quite a large space where a small pot can write volumes about a craft and art of a
potter as this certainly does. And from the political desk of I,
POTTER the quintessential differences between Canada and the US in a short video in case anyone
was confused or wondering;
I
was recently asked to throw a couple of larger serving bowls in stoneware,
destined for temmoku and ash and temmoku and iron for their surfaces. I don't
make a lot of bowls any bigger than a normal family will use as they are hard
to ship and need the right fit to sell, but an order is an order. Once in the
studio, I put on one of my favorite best of the 80s cds, wedged up the clay and
started throwing with the hope that throwing two bowls would yield two bowls
out of the kiln. As I was throwing and with the help of the music, my mind
wandered back to Cleveland State where I was throwing a series of 24"
serving pieces for a caterer and to one particular female student who just had
a series of questions for everything I was doing. On this particular morning,
studio tasks out of the way, I was throwing and then the inevitable questions to which she arrived at "well how much
clay was I using?". It may have been my mood, the music, the tasks at hand
but without skipping a beat I told her they were just 5lbs of clay each*. Off
she went, spending several hours throwing and just always came up shy, by half.
I realize this may sound cruel but as it turned out, by the end of her series,
she had thrown bowls larger than she had ever done so out of 5lbs of clay. I
let her in on the actual weight and told her they were only 2lbs of clay at
which point she figured out that I wasn't exactly truthful with her which brings
me back to today with two 18" plus bowls out of a mere 2lbs of clay,
between them. (* My wife thought it important to mention that during my
time at CSU, people all played jokes on each other, they were not malicious, it
was just part of the atmosphere of a fun, jovial, competitive pottery studio.)
There
really isn't a lot that one can say about this simple, honest bowl other than
to say it is a traditional Fujina-yaki hachi by Funaki Michitada. Thrown out of
a red earthenware and glazed in classic green glaze over slip with impressed
decoration and a rolled lip, the pooled deep iron-green highlights the piece
and just begs to be used or at the very least enjoyed. Funaki Michitadawas the inheritor of a 300 year old
tradition, Fujina-yaki and Holder of Intangible Cultural Property of Shimane
Prefecture and together with his son, Kenji, both through the popularity of
Leach, Yanagi and Hamada put their work on the international stage. This
particular bowl was bought in Fujina and brought to the US as a gift for a
friend back in the late 1950s and was packed in shaved excelsior as was common
for the time though no longer present. As I said, there is really little I can
say about this humble bowl other than in its humility, its nobility shines
through the rich surface. On a side note, this pot was originally collected by
Merlin C. Dailey, Japanese art dealer and author on the prints of Utagawa
Kuniyoshi.
Having
grown up just on the fringes of the Adirondack Park in NY State, I couldn't
help but seeing some of my old stomping grounds in this vivid oil painting.
Painted by Tsukigata Nahiko, this particular painting is just a slight bit
unusual for the artist-potter though not so far afield as to not be instantly
recognizable as his work. The colors evoke a rich fall scene of craggy hills and
clouds moving quickly past, the brushwork appears fast and determined and overall
displays a fine, bold visage typical of his work. I think one of the real
attributes of this painting is its ability to touch on the experiences of anyone
looking at it, it could be anywhere in Japan, the Adirondacks, the Scottish
Highlands or just aboutat any place the
viewer has been. Though I really love Tsukigata's Fuji and other Japanese landscape
paintings and even those painted in and around Paris, I am always partial to a
painting that makes me feel the artist came to my home and thought it worth
immortalizing it in oil on canvas. Every time I think of this painting the
beauty of the great forest in my backyard will always spring to mind. "Thousands
of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that
going to the mountains is going home; that wilderness is a necessity; and that
mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and
irrigating rivers but as fountains of life."John Muir 1898 (*Adirondack Park
Agency)
It
occurred to me quite recently that I hadn't made any etched porcelain pieces in
a while so I made a group of very simple round teabowl forms and the
illustrated piece is one of the results. Thrown out of porcelain and then finished
on the wheel with a sea sponge, a texture is left on the surface as you can see
in the photo after which the design is put on in wax and then the area around
is carefully removed using diluted vinegar in this case though straight water
works as well. The design here is quite simple, repeated ovoid devices around
the surface that intersect atvarious
points around the bowl. It was suggested that this particular photo makes the
design look a bit like some disenfranchised bug creature but I assure you all I
was after was a simple, geometric based design. I think the next time around I
am likely to use shellac as resist even though the cleanup is a pain in the butt,
the detail can be much finer, more crisp and quite possibly worth the effort.
My
last post regarding the Tsukigata Nahiko golden mizusashi got me thinking of
the metallic and lustrous surface or another pot that I took photos of a while
back, different but certainly as interesting. I first came in to contact with
Miura Shurei's pottery from seeing the Kikuchi collection and though I had seen
a few pieces first hand, I hadn't actually handled any until earlier this year.
This somewhat confusing detail shot is a close-up of the iridescent, metallic
surface of a tall octagonal bottle by Miura Shurei (b.1942) that shows off one
of his classic glazes, kujaku-yu (peacock glaze) which is bisected by one of
the lines created when the piece was faceted. The glaze has either run away or
has been intentionally manipulated to highlight each ridge line creating a
wonderful decorative element to an already stunning surface and vase. In low
light this bottle appears to be just a classic, Chinese influenced form with a
dark, smoky glaze but by subjecting it to varying light sources the pot shows
off its various lives with a different persona for each. As you may be able to
tell from this detail shot, this is a very spirited and contemplative vase with
a surface rich in variation and elements, it was great to have the opportunity
to see it first hand, literally. I should also mention that there is a
piece by Miura Shurei at the Sackler (Smithsonian) which you can see here; https://www.freersackler.si.edu/object/S1993.35/
I
was looking for some photos of a
Tokoname pot yesterday and in doing so stumbled across this detail shot of the
interior of the "golden mizusashi" that I posted up by Tsukigata Nahiko
some time back. For the lack of a better descriptor, the interior and in fact
most of the pot has an other-worldly appearance like something only the Hubble
can glimpse and as you can tell the surface just seems to glow or luminesce by
reflecting back all the light collected inside. In some respects I am reminded
of what I would expect some distant planet made predominantly of solid metal to
look like with areas of various elements coalesced to paint the surface with all kinds of unique textures
and color created as molten metal solidifies and creates stunning crystals. The irony is that is
probably exactly how this glaze came to be, heavily impregnated with various
metallic oxides which through heat created an array of metallic like effects
not unlike the so called manganese gold glaze used by modern American potters.
I truly enjoyed seeing this very unique Tsukigata mizusashi though I suspect
where there is one there are likely to be many, the visual texture was quite
stunning and when on display it just irradiated the area creating its own intergalactic
arena balancing reflected light and shadow and making the fullest use of form
to command all available space.
For
nearly two decades I have dragged around this odd plastic cup that I was given
as a gift as a joke and it has been ever present on my desk near the computer
all that time until recently when it actually just split in half. Though I carefully
glued it back together I realized it could no longer function in its previous
capacity as a pencil holder so I made another to replace it. The illustrated
pierced Oribe style pen holder is based
on a pierced Japanese Oribe candle holder that I really like and the piece was
quickly thrown in stoneware, incised to establish where I would cut out clay and
then holes were cut in the opposing solid areas to lighten up the visual form.
Obviously this was glazed in one of my Oribe formulas, in this case made from
lepidolite which highlights the incised decoration and the sharp cuts from the
piercings. I am sure that it was not my intension to have to make a pencil
holder the day before I did but it fit well within the kiln and adds credence
to the old maxim; necessity truly is the mother of invention. BTW
could there be anything less interesting that a blog post about a guy making a pencil
holder? It really is true, the fact that I have nothing to say means I
definitely should blog about it.
I
had an extremely brief encounter with a rather nice pot by Takauchi Shugo yesterday
at which time I took a lot of photos of it and then posted it up on Trocadero
all as a favor to a friend. The pot in question is the illustrated Oribe te-oke,
perhaps the quintessential form associated with Takauchi Shugo in which the the clay was roughly thrown leaving a variety of marks around the piece at which time he
then hacked away vertical channels disrupting the surface and adding a sense of
dramatic tension and even a hint of aggression to the piece. The top of the
form was also quickly cut and a handle was skillfully added to the form
which adds a striking visual presence to the pot and then it was glazed and
fired in his trademark, rich Oribe glaze which has accentuated every mark made.
The encounter of about two hour was brief as it went about as quickly as it
arrived; it arrived, it was re-packed, it was shipped. I enjoyed this brief
encounter but would have been just as happy have more time to spend with it but
hopefully the 100+ photos and possible slideshow video down the road will be
reminder enough of the time spent well.
As
I think about the very first pieces of pottery that were repurposed as chawan,
I think about simple, humble rice bowls, pots from kilns in China, Korea and
various spots around Kyoto and Japan, pieces that were as uncomplicated as
possible. To put it as succinctly as possible in a modern colloquial, these
bowls were no fuss, no muss, they were mostly unconsciously created, even
disposable in some respects as even potters of that time period may have had
the mind set, "you use them, you break them, we'll just make more".
When I saw this ever so simple chawan by Matsuzaki Ken, it is that origin that
sprung to mind; simply conceived, simply thrown, tooled and fired, focused
clarity of purpose. From my perspective making a simple bowl that is alive,
animated and is not boring is a true feat, almost herculean in nature but I
think this pot has succeeded, the form is strong and honest, broad and inviting
with a certain rhythm thrown into the clay perched atop a classic foot the
elevates and helps define the narrative of the chawan. The firing is always
risky but in this case, it must have been in the exact right spot for the piece
as it is blanketed in a near total glaze of natural ash that adds warmth,
texture and a visual appeal to the chawan that perhaps a few inches in any
other direction may not have cooperated. I know I drone on from time to time
about how everything has to go right to produce a good pot but it really does
boil down to a perfect storm of temperament, clay and firing to end up with a
pot that that is based on simplicity and has quite a story to share.
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