Art Apr 11, 2017
Kakiemon: Generations of beauty
by Alice Gordenker
There's still time to enjoy cherry blossoms. Through May 14, the Toguri Museum of Art in Tokyo is exhibiting a stunning new work by Sakaida Kakiemon XV, the current inheritor of one of the most famous names in Japanese porcelain. The very large lidded ...
Art / Openings In Tokyo Jan 3, 2017
'Sometsuke: Celebrating Four Centuries of Japanese Porcelain'
by Yuki Yamauchi
Jan. 7-Feb. 19 It is believed that Korean ceramist Yi Sam-pyeong, having traveled to Japan near the end of the 16th century, discovered kaolin white clay in Hizen Province (Saga Prefecture) and produced the first Japanese porcelain in 1616. Known as Hizen ware, or Imari ware, ...
Art Dec 20, 2016
Raku: A traditional contemporary art form
by Sachiko Tamashige
At the opening of "The Cosmos in a Tea Bowl: Transmitting a Secret Art Across Generations of the Raku Family" at The National Museum of Modern Art, in Kyoto, the current head of the Raku family, Kichizaemon XV (b. 1949), explained that the event ...
World / Social Issues Dec 20, 2016
Long before farming, humans cooked plants for food in ceramic pots 10,000 years ago: study
Humans used ceramic pots to cook wild plants more than 10,000 years ago, well before the advent of agriculture, researchers reported Monday. The findings are the earliest direct proof that our species processed plants for food. The vessels, discovered in Libya, contained traces of wild grasses ...
Art / Openings In Tokyo Dec 13, 2016
'Contemporary Japanese Crafts: The Kikuchi Kanjitsu Prize II'
by Yuki Yamauchi
Dec. 17-March 20 Since it opened in 2003, the Musee Tomo has focused on exhibiting contemporary ceramic art. Last year, however, it selected 12 artists known to have made innovations in traditional Japanese crafts for an exhibition that presented ceramics, lacquerware, metalwork and other applied ...
Art / Openings Outside Tokyo Dec 13, 2016
'The Cosmos in a Tea Bowl: Transmitting a Secret Art across Generations of the Raku Family'
by Yuki Yamauchi
Dec. 17-Feb. 12 Ceramic utensils are usually sculpted at the potter's wheel before being fired in batches. However, Raku ware, a type of pottery introduced during the 16th century by ceramist Chojiro, is shaped by hand using a spatula, with each piece being individually fired. ...
Art / Openings Outside Tokyo Dec 6, 2016
Analyzing Pottery: Glazes
by Yuki Yamuchi
Dec. 10-Feb. 12 Pottery is a complicated process involving mixing and fine-tuning clay, creating and refining vessels or sculptures, and then developing and applying glazes before firing. Though glazing is one of the final steps of pottery that is often used to decorative effect, it ...
Art Oct 4, 2016
Kanjiro Kawai sculpted a new vision of pottery
by Robert Yellin
Japan's history of ceramics stretches back for millenniums, with most spinners of clay remaining nameless. One star, however, did shape a new world of pottery: Kanjiro Kawai (1890-1966). Kawai left us 50 years ago this autumn. Thankfully, though, he bestowed upon us some of the ...
Art / Openings In Tokyo Aug 9, 2016
'The Power of Colors: Contemporary Ceramic Art from Kikuchi Collection'
by Megan Green
Aug. 6-Dec. 4 Color can be a powerful device to convey messages without the use of words. The colors of traffic lights are instantly recognized as green for "go," yellow for "get ready" and red for "slow down"; meanwhile blue is the color of the ...
Art Jul 5, 2016
The embellished world of Kozan Miyagawa's ceramics
by Matthew Larking
In 1954-55, three Kyoto ceramists of the Sodeisha group of artists began a revolution by creating objects that fulfilled no practical role. Kazuo Yagi, Osamu Suzuki and Hikaru Yamada took away the mouths of vases or added several more to them, played with vessels' legs ...
Art / Openings Outside Tokyo Jul 5, 2016
'Bernard Leach 130th Birth Anniversary'
by Megan Green
July 9-Sept 25 Bernard Howell Leach is regarded as one of the greatest figures of 20th-century art, a crucial pioneer of blending Western pottery with Asian techniques and influences. Leach spent some of his childhood in Japan, and he returned there to teach etching during ...