Japanese Bonsai Pots Blog

Bonsai Pottery by Haruyoshi

Posted on January 27, 2012 by japanesepots

In todays feature we’ll have a look at potter Haruyoshi. One of the modern masters of painted porcelain pots, including sometsuke(cobalt blue underglaze), red underglaze, and five color styles of porcelain painting. Along with Gekkou and Fujikake Yuzan, Haruyoshi is one of the most popular potters of painted porcelain bonsai pottery, and his pots are on the rise in value. At between 1/4 to 1/2 the price of a Gekkou or Yuzan, Haruyoshi pots are still relatively inexpensive, and undervalued for the quality.

Haruyoshi, photo Courtesy Yorozuen

A marvelous winter scene! Winter scene pots are rare, which seems strange to me, given that the Gafu and Kokufu exhibitions are held in the dead of winter each year, I would think there would be more! It’s tough to tell from the photo the photo if this pot is overglaze painting or a combination of underglaze enamel and overglaze enamel. The white overglaze of the snow on the Celadon green porcelain is fantastic, and there is some nice detail to the boat and it’s pilots.

Haruyoshi, 3" My Collection

A Small Haruyoshi sometsuke in my collection. When you hold one in your hand, and see them in person, its quite easy to see why they are becoming so popular and fast becoming expensive!

Round with Sometsukelandscape and yellow border. Very nice brush work on such a small piece.

A multi color painted pot with some very nice detail and brush work. Just enough negative space to the left to appear uncluttered.

Small 5 color painted pot, sometsuke bordering. This looks to be a combination of under and overglaze enamel work. The 5 colors(go-sai) were made popular in the Ming dynasty Chinese porcelain pieces, and still continuetot be the most popular in Kutani and other porcelain wares.

Another Go-sai pot with some great detailing and brushwork.

A nice Sometsuke landscape with centered view. Painted bonsai landscape pots will generally have negative space on one side or the other, there to help reinforce the directional movement of the tree. IRilke this pot as it could be used with a tre with movement to the left or right.

A nice red painting with blue border. I love how this cascade pot presents a little cliff side landscape overhanging the river, with it’s semi-cascade black pine.

The above and below pots are two great examples of Haruyoshi glazed pots. In addition to masterful painting, Haruyoshi produces some nice glazed pots with interesting colors. The thick double glaze on the pot below is especially nice.

Haruyoshi, 4" by 2" tall

We’ll finish off with one final glazed pot from Haruyoshi, in my collection. This pot is beginning to show a nice patina, as can be seen from the bottom detail.

Hope you enjoyed the marvelous pots of Haruyoshi, til the next post….Hopefully Ill have a great new collection post soon, as Kokufu is next week!

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Bushuan Pots Part 2

Posted on January 26, 2012 by japanesepots

Today’s post we’ll look at a few more pots from Shigeru Fukuda, aka Bushuan, the subject of our last post. In addition to the Bushuan from my collection on my “For Sale” page, all of the pots shown in today’s post are available for sale from Japan, are 5.5-6″, and come with original box and cloth, drop me a line if you’re interested.
It’s very easy to see from these pieces why Bushuan pots are always mentioned in conjunction with Tofukuji. His glazes are unique and spectacular, yet harmonious in the same way. Like Tofukuji, Bushuan began as a hobby potter, was self-taught, and came to pottery as a second career. So many parallels for these two masters of glaze.

Heian Tofukuji

The Tofukuji pot in the thumbnail clearly shows the links and similarity these potters have, the analogy made by so many is most definitely apt! This Bushuan called almost be an homage! The Tofukuji pot is from the collection of Matt Ouwinga, of Kaede Bonsai-En.

Thanks for stopping in to see a few more fantastic pots. I hope you enjoyed seeing them as much as I enjoyed finding them! Tomorrow’s post I’ll be profiling potter and painter Haruyoshi, a modern master of underglaze painting.

UPDATE:12/27
All 5 Bushuan pots pictured have been sold! I still have 1 featured on my “For Sale” page that is available. This guys work moves fast!

Posted in Modern Potters | Tagged bonsai, glazes, homage, parallels, pots, potters | Leave a comment

Pots by Shigeru Fukuda(Bushuan)

Posted on January 19, 2012 by japanesepots

Today’s post is a selection of pots from contemporary potter Shigeru Fukuda, who makes pots under the trade name “Bushuan” or sometimes, “Fukumo”.
A former professional car racer, Fukuda took up Bonsai as a hobby at 27, became well known as a Satsuki enthusiast, and soon began collecting pots, especially old Chinese. He began making pots in 1986, and met with fast acclaim. His glazes are very nice, with pretty fantastic kiln changes. His work and glazes are often compared to Tofukuji.

Shigeru Fukuda(For Sale!) 10.2cm by 5.7cm

You can find this wonderful pot on my For Sale page. Another exceptional multiglaze pot. I think I see three or four different layers of glaze in there! The pairing of the colors is pretty magical, crackled greens, white spotted blues, leathery oranges…masterpiece.

I love the blue drippy glaze on this pot. The white highlights really bring out the depth of the varying shades of blue.

A multi-glaze pot with quite a bit more subtlety than the previous two. Still, the thick running glaze and blue highlights are pretty fantastic.

A lightly crackled blue and green round with top lip. I love the long drips of Indigo turning to blue at the base. The patina on this pot, which is starting to form, can be observed by comparing the interior glaze with the exterior.

Another round with major drips! the ridges in the clay body have created places for the red to pool and coalesce, creating whirls and vortices. Very nice effect.

Thick blue-green glaze with cloud feet. The cloud feet are almost completely obscured by the thick running glaze, a beautiful pot.

Very fine crackle in subtle blues, greens, and yellows.

Another drippy blue-green with cloud feet, lotus shaped. I pulled this off of the Songheryuan Bonsai Pot Blog, as can be seen from the photo. Its an excellent blog out of Taiwan with lots of great Bonsai.

Photo Copyright Yorozuen

A more subtle blue, green, and indigo round. This pot just begs for a cascade or semi cascade Umemodoki, or Chanomeles with Red flowers!

A nice blue and green soft square holding a very nice Kaede in development. Its clear the front has changed right 15-20 degrees since this matchup, it will be nice to see it oriented properly. This tree came from the blog,
http://ssbin.blog.shinobi.jp/
Ive mentioned it before, you should really check it out if you havent already!

Little green and white round with some carving detail and full cloud feet. A nice little crackle to the glaze, and the carving is subtle. A pot that will take on patina very well in time.

Another blue crackle round with some patina beginning to show. Fantastic with a red maple or to contrast with the yellow flowers of a forsythia or Quince fruit.

The only underglaze painted pot I’ve seen by Bushuan. The painting is reminiscent of Ishida Shoseki.

And we’ll finish with a simple small rectangle with a gorgeous bright yellow crackle glaze that is extraordinarily thick. Another pot that will take patina very well, and be spectacular in the years to come.

I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing a few pots from contemporary potter Shigeru Fukuda. I’m still working to get that gold repair post up, hopefully just a couple of days!
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Posted in Modern Potters | Tagged clay body, fukuda, glazes, subtle blue | Leave a comment

Two Special Tofukuji Pots In Depth

Posted on January 13, 2012 by japanesepots

For today’s post we will look at 2 Heian Tofukuji pots in the collection of bonsai artist and fellow American pot collector Matt Ouwinga. Matt has a great eye for pots and the most extensive collection of Tofukuji pots in the States.

Both of these pots were in the collection of Yorozuen at one time or another, the first was purchased from them directly. Yorozuen, run by three generations of the Hukano family, has some of the highest credentials a nursery can possess, both for pottery and for shohin bonsai. The youngest Hukano is Executive Director of the National Bonsai Pieces Association(the official pottery organization) and the middle Hukano is also an official advisor.
Now…on to the pots!

An exceptionally glazed Tofukuji round green drippy pot with black glaze painted stiching. The kiln changes to the glaze in this pot are spectacular, mottled and drippy in some places, clear and defined in others. I think the mottling could have come from the coarsness of the clay, which may be quite intentional, and not always owing to the local clay quality. Many potters intentionally insert small rocks and pebbles, which explode in the kiln, creating a coarse appearance, quite a common technique in Shigaraki. A true masterwork, this pot is one of the rarest of the rare. The stamp is called “mokube”. There are only 10 authentic Tofukuji pots with this stamp in existence. It is early work, around 60 years old. At one point, Yorozuen had 7 of the 10, this was the last of them. The master there does not believe that any will appear for sale again.

A great tiny little cascade. There are a couple of things that make this pot exceptional. First is the footing. While there are other Tofukuji pots with this style of base and feet, they are very rare. Next is the glaze. It’s quite difficult to find half glazed pots with such clearly defined angles to the run, oweing, I suppose, to the difficulty of the technique. The color to the glaze is also nice. Third is the chop. This chop, like the one before, is also rare(though not 10 pots in existence rare!)and a bit rarer for being on the outside of the pot, but what makes it unique is that it’s inlaid in gold, that’s one of one status for sure!

I hope you enjoyed seeing these pots as much as I do! For more on Matt’s exceptional collection, and some great seedling stock, visit
http://www.kaedebonsai.com/

Posted in Famous and Antique Potters, Pot Info, ID, Hanko, Books, ect. | Tagged coarse appearance, great eye, little cascade, mottling, shohin bonsai | Leave a comment

Pots From My Collection 8(and 6)

Posted on January 10, 2012 by japanesepots

Here are a few more pots from my collection that I thought were worthy of a few shots. As one of my readers pointed out, I completely skipped Collection Post 6 and went from 5 to 7. So this will be number 6 and number 8. Enjoy some pots!

Heian Tofukuji, First generation, 6"

Detail

A First generation Tofukuji with cut corners and cut feet, pear skin clay. Tofukuji pots with this stamp were made from the middle to the end of his career. I love the pear skin clay of this pot, and the angles and cut corners are clean and straight.

Heian Kousen, 4.5" x 3" tall

A clear Tofukuji homage pot by Heian Kousen. Clean lines and a nice finish. You can see the type of Tofukuji pots this is based on here:
http://samedge.wordpress.com/2009/08/30/heian-tofukuji

Okatani Zeshin, about 4" round

A porcelain Zeshin frog pot with really cool crackle to the porcelain glaze. This guys pots never never cease to amaze me!

Haruyoshi, 4" by 2" tall

While Haruyoshi is famous for his wonderful painted porcelain pots, his glazed pots are quite nice as well. This one is starting to show a nice patina.

Togen, 5", Ornate Chinese stand

Its very difficult to capture the fine quality of a Togen pot on film. The burnished finish on Togen pots is the best Ive seen, they positively glow. A relatively unknown Tokoname potter here in the west, Im not sure if they were ever offered through the Tokoname Yuyaku.

Horie Bikoh, 6" by 3.5"

An old Bikoh round white pot showing a great patina from years of use. Bikoh pots are most commonly seen in bright, pure colors, often with glaze inlays of birds and dragons. The clean colors and glazes of Bikoh pots take patina very well.

Tarugen, 3" by .75"

A tiny little painted pot by Tarugen. I like the little bird on the branch, a quaint and cute little pot.

Hope you enjoyed seeing a few more pots from my collection! This week Ive been working on repairing a couple of Antique Chinese pots using gold. The technique is not especially difficult, and the results much nicer than simple repairs with epoxy. Ill detail the technique and its history in Japan, along with the results of my first attempts, in the next post.

Posted in Famous and Antique Potters, Modern Potters, My Personal Collection | Leave a comment

Chop and Signature Resource

Posted on January 10, 2012 by japanesepots

If you look at the top of the page here next to the “About” page you’ll see that the new “Chop and Signature Resource” page is now up. Either hover with your mouse over the chop image or click on it to identify the potter. There are nearly 400 chops up now, with a whole bunch more to follow as soon as I find the time to edit the photos and upload them.
I hope everyone finds the resource useful, I’ve spent hours upon hours researching potters and their marks, and I would be remiss if I didn’t share that with the community. Enjoy identifying those pots people!

Posted in Famous and Antique Potters, Modern Potters, Pot Info, ID, Hanko, Books, ect. | 1 Comment

Antique Chinese Pot

Posted on December 30, 2011 by japanesepots

Here is another antique Chinese pot I picked up a while ago. I thought the recent information I found about it would be interesting. The pot was made well over 100 years ago, and is old crossing. The clay is very rough and rugged, and has drainage holes over 2″ wide! The stamp reads “翼記” and reads “Yoku Ki”. It measures 14.5 × 10.3 × 4.1 cm. Antique Chinese pots of this size are tough to find, most are very large, as big trees were the style back then.

Bottom showing unique oversize holes and stamp.
The most interesting thing I found about this pot is its provenance. While idly thumbing through some old blog posts, I discovered my pot in an old blog post by one of my favorite bloggers in Japan! High end bonsai pottery is a small world indeed!
You can see the blog post here, and I highly recommend checking out the other posts, it’s a great blog and full of information about bonsai and pottery, featuring photos of fantastic trees and pots.

http://ssbin.blog.shinobi.jp/Entry/35/

Hope you enjoyed another great pot. I’ll be doing another post on some interesting pots Monday, and stay tuned for a complete Hanko and Rakkan database page, I hope to have it completed by the middle of January, featuring more than 300 chops, stamps, and signatures from Japanese and Chinese potters and Kilns. Until then, feel free to email me with any pottery questions at Gastrognome@aol.com

Posted in Famous and Antique Potters, My Personal Collection | Leave a comment

Japanese Bonsai Pots Blog

Bonsai Pottery by Haruyoshi

Bushuan Pots Part 2

Pots by Shigeru Fukuda(Bushuan)

Two Special Tofukuji Pots In Depth

Pots From My Collection 8(and 6)

Chop and Signature Resource

Antique Chinese Pot

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