“No, raku is low fired. We make stoneware.”

“What’s stoneware?”

“Stoneware is fired at a very high temperature — 1,200 degrees Centigrade,
2,200 degrees Fahrenheit. Stoneware is partially vitrified — it turns almost to
glass when fired — and so it needs no glaze to be impermeable. Glaze is merely
decorative; it’s not functional in the sense that it’s required for a vessel to hold
liquid or have strength. Function, that’s what is important.”

“Architecture.”

“Just like that! That’s why it’s important to have one’s hands directly
involved in every step of the creation and why it’s important for me at this stage in
my career to do everything myself, even building with my own hands the building I
work in. The potter’s hands can be seen and felt in the final product when another
holds and uses his pot, or bowel, or plate, or cup. Pots should be used in everyday
life. They should have a function. They should not be made merely to look at. I
like to do tea bowls best of all.”

“Philosophy.”

“Indeed! That’s what’s missing in modern things. There’s no apparent
connection to anything in the stuff that’s drowning us. You can’t tell what it was
made from, or who made it, or how it was made, or why. Some modern things are
just plain ugly, garish, noisy, smelly, and vulgar. Or worse, they’re too perfect:
cold and impersonal and dead. Plastic. One thing I like about Japan is that there is
still much of the ancient culture to encounter and use every day, along with what’s
new. You’ll see. You’ll feel it.”

“So when you built this place what did you do? Did you have to go and get
plans and approvals and permits and so on?”

“Nope, I just bought this little piece of land and built what I wanted, the way
I wanted it. It’s mine. In England, a person has to make sure whatever he wants to
do is okay with everyone else before doing anything — and it’s usually not. But it
isn’t like that here.”

“It’s like that in Canada — except up north where you can walk on land
where no one else has ever set foot. You can even stake a claim there.”

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19

Japanby Morley Evans

November 21, 2000