An Introduction to Pottery for Foreigners
11/26-12/3 Kojun Ueno
Aren't you interested in using Japanese pottery in your daily life? There are two advices to collect Japanese pottery.
- Know some categories of pottery
- Have themes of your collections
The first one helps you to remember what you see and looking for alternative products you should compare with favorites you've found. The second one is a kind of searching condition to collect similar things. Looking for similar things probably makes you learn fast.
1 Categories of pottery
1-1 Touki and Jiki
Most large and obvious categories are Touki and Jiki. Jiki is smooth and thin pottery baked at higher temperature. Occidental pottery such as Copenhagen and Wedge Wood are Jiki. Touki is thicker than Jiki. Some of them are covered with thin glass layer, and some have a rough surface.
You may prefer Touki. You can enjoy the feel of materials, individual shapes and accidental patterns on them.
Or you may prefer Jiki. You can enjoy their fine white color and paintings on them. And if you are familiar with world history, Jiki may be interesting for you. Technology and fashion of Jiki have been going to and fro between the Orient and the Occident.
Most people find which they prefer easily. Which do you prefer?
1-2 Well-known sorts of Japanese pottery
I will list up well-known sorts of Japanese pottery for beginners. The following list contains only those which are easy to distinguish. Type each word of Chinese characters in Google's image search to see how they look.
Touki
- Shigaraki-yaki（信楽焼） and likes
- I hope you like the rough feel of them. Their surface has embedded small grains of stone and many pits there were grains before being baked.
- Shigaraki town is the producing center of statues of raccoons. They are also Shigaraki-yaki.
- Bizen-yaki（備前焼）
- I hope you like their sadistic pattern caused by fire.
- It's good for beer. (It makes minute bubbles)
- Some of them are suitable for meat.
- Iga-yaki（伊賀焼）
- It's green and dark ash colored destructive art with horrible distortion and scorchings.
- Green glasses covering some of them like thick sauce are mysterious.
- Its concept is "rupture".
- Hagi-yaki（萩焼）
- I hope you like its feature of "Change". Well-use reflects in its scenery (= pattan and color of surface) well. We call such change "maturity".
- The cracks on surface and pink color remind me of a creature.
- Some say it looks warm and peaceful, some say it looks a little grotesque.
- Raku-yaki（楽焼）
- They are cups for traditional tea. Some of them are red, some are black. You may find black ones in Samurai movies.
- Its concept is "breakable easily".
- Tokoname -yaki （常滑焼） with mogake（藻掛け）
- They have ruins of burned seaweed called "mogake". It reminds me that Tokoname town is close to seashore.
- Shino-yaki（志野焼）
- It's covered partially with semitransparent coating like sugar coating with many pinholes. It was covered but you can also see the base clay. You may enjoy them if you like to see see-through clothes.
- Oribe-design（織部）
- Long-standing but modernistic design with colors of green, white and black. If it had red instead of black, it would be Christmas design.
Jiki
- Imari-yaki（伊万里焼）, Arita-yaki（有田焼）
- They show you traditional and colorful paintings.
- Kutani-yaki（九谷焼）
- Some of them show you beautiful cool paintings and calligraphy.
2 Having themes of collection
As I wrote above, you should have themes of collections. It would be a help that you know some collecting styles.
-. Collection based on a technical category
If you are attracted by a certain category in 1.2, you can be a Bizen-yaki collector, an Oribe style design collector or an Imari collector.
This collecting style trains your eyes to see details and slight differences, and exhibitions of your collection in this style will be nice looking.
-. Collection for coordination
If you are interested in inviting and serving people, you can be a collector for coordination. It's a purpose-based approach.
For example:
- Tableware coordination for dinners, tea times or parties.
- Room coordination. (Vases with flowers, lighting instruments)
- Traditional tea ceremony coordination
This collecting style enriches your life directly. But it requires a wide range of concern and good sense.
-. Collection of a certain kind of item
If you drink sake or cups of coffee at home, you can be a collector of the same kind. It's also a purpose based approach but it's easier than "Collection for coordination".
For example:
- Guinomi (tiny cup for sake) - Small things are convenient to collect. But you should know that Guinomies are not cheap despite their tiny size.
- Coffee cup - You can enjoy both of cups and saucers.
- Dish - Start at middle or small sized dishes because large ones are expensive.
This collecting style enriches your life a little, and helps you to learn the variation of techniques. Also you can enjoy exhibition of your collections and enjoy finding your best selection in this collecting style.
-. Collection based on pictures
Some people collect pottery with pictures of a certain kind of object such as a grape, owl, Kappa(Traditional monster like turtle and human), calligraphy or scenery.
But I don't know much about this collecting style.
-. Collection of Antique
If you are interested in history, you may be an antique pottery collector. But I don't know much about this collecting style.