A message regarding the exhibition "Karatsu Ware - Still and Dynamic Tea Bowls by 12 Artists"

It's hard to believe that two years have already passed since the first "2010 Karatsu Ware Today - A Competition of Skills by 12 Ceramic Artists" exhibition was held at Kakiden Gallery in March 2010. The exhibition was a great success, with a constant stream of visitors every day. The second "Karatsu Ware - Tranquil and Dynamic Tea Bowls by 12 Artists" exhibition will finally be held at the same gallery in February. Two of the members have changed. The participants are twelve artists from the third generation of Karatsu ware ( Sakurei Okamoto , Yasumoto Kajiwara , Naoki Kojima , Sajirou Tanaka , Jinenbou Nakagawa , Taki Nakazato , Tarouemon Nakazato , Setsuo Hamazaki , Dohei Fujinoki , Munehiko Maruta , Yasuyoshi Yoshino ) and the fourth generation ( Naoto Yano ). Incidentally, the first generation was Mu'an Nakazato, and the second generation was Ho'an Nakazato. The first generation aimed to revive the classical style of Karatsu ware, and the second generation aimed for artistic independence. The third generation, however, learned from both and are artists who firmly rooted themselves in the Karatsu region. Their work is by no means a copy of old Karatsu ware, but rather reflects their individuality and sensibilities. The fourth generation, while admiring the third generation, freely inspires each other.

Jinenbou Nakagawa , a leading ceramic artist of the third generation, passed away on December 13th last year. In October, Mr. Nakagawa held the " Jinenbou Nakagawa 30th Anniversary Exhibition" in Tokyo. That solo exhibition was a very pleasant one, featuring only works that Mr. Nakagawa was satisfied with.

Jiro Aoyama says that there are six aspects to a tea bowl: three qualities—dignity, wabi-sabi—and three qualities—volume, strength, and purity. He says that these three qualities and three qualities come together to create the form of the tea bowl. The word "form" here has something that cannot be expressed by the word "shape."

While Mr. Shizenbo's tea bowls don't fulfill all these requirements, they exude a pure and serene quality, a sense of movement within stillness—like the spaces between lines in writing, the negative space in painting, or the air in pottery. At the opposite extreme is the dynamic tea bowl. Dynamic tea bowls have been favored by the Japanese since the time of Oribe ware, and they remain a form of tea bowl expressed by many contemporary artists. However, in Zen terms, I believe that movement is stillness, and stillness is movement, and they are inseparable. In short, both the still tea bowl and the dynamic tea bowl are ultimately one, and neither can be a tea bowl that lacks a sense of atmosphere.

I sent this message to the twelve participating artists, and asked them to challenge themselves to create tea bowls with a sense of atmosphere. I believe this will result in a truly interesting exhibition. Furthermore, using "atmosphere" as a keyword, each artist submitted one tea bowl that represents their goal or basic style, and displayed it alongside their own original works. This allowed visitors to see the tea bowls from the artists' perspective and conveyed the passionate feelings of the creators. The tea bowls featured in the catalog are each artist's best work. However, some artists did not make it into the catalog in time because they did not want to include works they were not satisfied with. This, in itself, is proof of their seriousness towards this exhibition, and I am looking forward to its opening.

Senior Researcher, Japan Ceramic Society

Kouichi Mori