If all the pottery that I live with and use suddenly disappeared from my home, I would find myself quite blue. Those pieces, in their silent voices, spark my imagination and encourage me to live each day with grace and style; they are good friends. Someday I know I will have to part with them; that is inevitable, so I think of myself as just their caretaker until it is time for them to float along the river of time into another's hands.
That was also the way that Masako Shirasu (1910-98) must have thought. She was one of the great collectors and writers on Japanese art in the 20th century. A retrospective exhibition of her life is on now at the magnificent Miho Museum in Shigaraki, Shiga Prefecture.
For Shirasu, living with good art was "as necessary as breathing," and she offered prayers and thanks to her favorite works, in particular a creamy white Korean jar that she said had given her "50 years of dreams."