adirtymindisajoyforever:

Kintsukuroi 

I was intreagued by an image of a repaired japanese teabowl and found this catalogue with excellent essays giving some insight on the origin,   techniques and place in japanese culture of this art form. Well worth the read. Once more I realised how fascinating the Japanese culture is and how deeply it is ingrained in every aspect of life.

Some exeprts from the texts. Full text here

Even as a long history and consummate appreciation of mended ceramics in the pract ice of Tea exist, these talismanic object s are seen in the tearoom only during the last two weeks of Oct ober. The waning days of autumn are known as the season of nagori in Japan, of which the appreciation of mended ceramics is an essential part

Before the game starts, the host has selected 30 to 40 pieces of art that will decorate the tea room, be used to serve the meal, or to prepare the tea. These would include a piece of calligraphy, a lacquered jar that holds the powdered green tea, the ceramic tea bowl, or the sliver of bamboo used to scoop the tea. Collect ively, these are called “utensils” (do¯gu). The guests must assume that each utensil in the tea room was select ed by the host for one or more expressive purposes; that the day’s combination of utensils is unique to that gathering; and that many of these individual pieces carry meanings that merge into larger patterns of meaning, into themes. Each piece of art is a puzzle in itself, but the unique assemblage of these pieces is a higher-level puzzle. The goal of the guest is to understand as many of the puzzles as possible, and thus discern the host’s expressive intent. This process of creating puzzles by the careful and intentional select ion of utensils is called toriawase.

ps, if you search Kintsukuroi on tumblr, you’ll find pictures of excactly two bowls. What’s up with that? boring.

Light Painting and Life with Pablo Picasso