About Oribe Ware
Oribe ware possesses a distinctive beauty unlike that of other Japanese ceramics. While Japan has produced many kinds of pottery, few express such freedom in shape and decoration.
Oribe ware emerged during the Momoyama period, a time when bold ideas and individual expression found a place in the arts. Its inventive forms and lively designs still convey a remarkable sense of vitality.
How, then, did Oribe ware come into being? According to a long-standing theory, Furuta Oribe (1544–1615), a prominent tea master and samurai who studied under Sen no Rikyū, commissioned Mino potters to create works reflecting his own aesthetic preferences. Although the extent of his direct involvement is uncertain, his distinctive taste is closely associated with Oribe ware.
The appeal of Oribe ware lies not only in its shapes and patterns, but also in the quality of the clay, construction methods, glazes, and the way these elements work together.
About Narumi Oribe
Among the many varieties of Oribe ware, Narumi Oribe is particularly distinctive. It is made by joining iron-rich red clay with white clay.
A copper-green glaze is applied to the white clay sections, while the red clay sections are decorated with patterns in white slip and iron. The warm tones of the red clay contrast beautifully with the green glaze, creating the characteristic appearance of Narumi Oribe.
This style was often used for handled bowls (tebachi), square dishes, and mukōzuke (small dishes used for serving food). Some kutsugata (shoe-shaped) tea bowls were also made with white clay joined only where the green glaze would be applied, and finished on the potter’s wheel. More rarely, the technique was used for water jars shaped like teapots.
Kato Hajime regarded this clay-joining technique as a further development of the neriage techniques found in Shino ware. Joining two different clays requires considerable skill, as their shrinkage during drying and firing must be sufficiently compatible. The properties of the local clays also played an important role in the development of this technique.
The photograph shows a work by Hayashi Torao.
Reference: Kato Hajime, Oribe (Tōki Zenshū, Vol. 5, Heibonsha, 1965), supervised by Koyama Fujio.
