Some four or five centuries ago in Japan, a lavish technique emerged for repairing broken ceramics. Artisans began using lacquer and gold pi

Yuki Tatsumi was working as a waiter in a restaurant when one day, as he was cleaning up a table, he noticed that a customer had intricately folded up the paper chopstick sleeve and left it behind. Japan doesn’t have a culture of tipping but Tatsumi imagined that this was a discreet , subconscious method of showing appreciation. He began paying attention and sure enough noticed that other customers were doing the same thing. Tatsumi began collecting these “tips” which eventua

Raku Kichizaemon, the fifteenth grand master of the Raku line of potters, creates avant-garde works of ceramic art rooted in 450 years of tradition. With a tea bowl of his own making in hand, he discusses the philosophical underpinnings of Raku ware.

ARETHE festival aspires to make people experience contemporary Japanese art through the ritual tradition called chado (the way of tea). At first, chado and contemporary art may seem unrelated. Yet, historically the way of tea and it’s tea ceremony practice had represented a very forward- thinking approach to appreciate art. http://www.mizenfineart.com Or look at an old tea bowl through the eyes of of a contemporary artist. Dry Lacquer Teabowl

The teabowl has become an iconic form in contemporary ceramics. Having travelled from Japan, where it was an inherent part of chanoyu, or tea ceremony, it has evolved and adapted to become something very different in the West. - Bloomsbury Publishing

Sixteen essays by Soetsu Yanagi, key figure of the Japanese folk craft (Mingei) movement. A must read for anybody who liked Yanagi's book The Unknown Craftsman: A Japanese Insight into Beauty. - Highly recommended. Published by JPIC | Hardcover | ISBN 978-4-916055-75-0 | 246 pages | March 2017

"Kintsugi is the remarkable Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with elegance and grace - a tradition with a lot to teach us more generally about how to handle the broken bits of ourselves." - School of life