Japanese Pottery - A Look Into The Beautiful World

Japan has a long esteemed history with pottery that dates back for over thousands of years.  They found this as an outlet to not only express themselves and their emotions but also as a way to show each of the culture’s differing aesthetics.

They did not puttime and effort into “perfecting” their pieces. It was important to them to highlight irregularities, mistakes, fingerimpressions or any other things that made the piece special. They would seekout pieces with the most discrepancies. 

The term ‘pottery’is sometimes replaced by the word ‘ceramic' which is fine. They areinterchangeable. They are made exactly the same way. The only differencebetween the two is the clay that is used and the temp it’s heated at which willdetermine the result that is produced.

Folks use ‘ceramic'if the piece is viewed as fine art and made for visual appeal rather thanpracticality. ‘Pottery' is used for pieces that are deemed to have functionality.

There are threemain types of Japanese pottery.  Underthese three main types fall a multitude of sub-types of pottery.

There Main Types Of Japanese Pottery

• Earthware.  This is the first and probably the oldesttype of pottery from the Jomon period. It’s distinguished for showing connectionsbetween nature and art. It is very simplistic, made manually by hand, roughly finishedwith a muted palette of colors significant to the earth’s colors. The eccentricitiesof the shapes and inconsistencies are what were sought after with these pieces.The pottery was hard, brittle and overall porous so couldn’t hold water. Inlater years, they were glazed in order to hold liquid. Earthware was definitelyused for functionality for things like food and storage. It laid the foundationfor many types of pottery that followed.
• Stoneware.  Stoneware was produced during the Naraperiod. Nara also means ‘three-color glaze'. This stoneware was very durable, dense and waterproof. It generally cameunglazed but could be glazed for decorative purposes. Nara stoneware was green,white and beige.  Since it came on thescene around the same time as Buddhism, it was used in a lot of religiousservices or for royalty.  The firing ofthe clay was mostly done in Japan’s Capital's kiln.
• Porcelain.  Although this was originally imported fromChina, Japanese porcelain was created during the Edo period. It was hard, shiny,white translucent clay.  Pretty cool and unique.Japan highly regarded the blue and white ware for its beauty. The designs werenot only fascinating to the Japanese but also other countries to whom theJapanese started to export the pottery. Japan began to create “appliances” thatthey felt would suit the needs of these other countries with their porcelainbut would have no use to them directly e.g. the coffee pot for Europe.

Today Japanesepotters have grown away from their simplistic, natural, handmade way ofproducing pottery. They no longer push for pieces with deformities or createpieces for functionality.

They have beenintroduced to tools and wheels and the modern idea of perfectionism in theirpieces. Every line, every corner, every curve must be precise. Their potterynow serves as show pieces as opposed to the rugged, useful vessels of days goneby.  They have lost their connectionbetween art and nature.

The pottery madetoday would not fit into a traditional Japanese home.  We have to wonder if there still are anyold-school potters out there in Japan still doing things as they once were.

No matter.  Pottery will forever be one of  Japan’s greater contributions to the world. Astheir culture continues to change from year to year, decade to decade andcentury to century it may make its way back to its roots.

This is just alittle bit of fun additional information. These are the sub-types (if you will) of pottery.

Japanese Sub-Types Of Pottery

Aganoware, Aizuhongoware,Akahadaware, Akaxuware, Amokusa pottery, Aritaware, Bankoware, Bizenware,Echizenware, Hagiware, Hasamiware, Igaware, Iwamiware, Izushiware, Karatsuware,Kasamaware, Kiyomizuware, Koishiwaraware, Kosobeware, Kutaniware, Kyoware, Mashikoware,Mikawachiware, Minoware, Mumyoiware, Oborisoma, Ontanuware, Rakuware,Satsumaware, Setoware, Shigarakiware, Shitoroware, Shodaiware, Takatoriware, Tambaware,Tobeware, Tokonameware, Tsuboyaware, Zezeware

Japanese potteryis so exquisite.  To collect piecesfrom  or more of a period would be veryexciting. Happy hunting.l