Our eagerness for Bizen ware exhibition

For ”Our eagerness for ’Bizen ware exhibition’”

Bizen ware has been kept to make until today unchanged since the medieval period, as a non-glazed fired ceramic. The reasons are the soil. Bizen soil is the finest particle clay among the six old kilns and is vulnerable to sudden changes in temperature, so it will take time to slowly raise the firing temperature. The soil can be divided into mountain soil and rice field, especially the soil of rice field is an adhesion plasticity, therefore the finished Bizen ware is the extremely finest. The character of Bizen ware are Botamochi, Hidasuki, Goma and Sengiri. The pots and mortar from Kamakura to Muromachi period, and masterpieces and fine works of the tea pottery had been actively produced from Momoyama to Edo period. Currently, there are various artists who go back to the traditional ceramics, and devote the new Bizen ware style. It would be fine if they make and express own Bizen ware.

We wishes you enjoy the ”Our eagerness for Bizen ware exhibition”.

Koichi Mori

(Art critic - Executive Director, Permanent Member of the Japan Ceramic Association)