“Hirado Egg-Shell Ware & Mikawachi Porcelain of Japan - 400 Years and Beyond” Exhibition

The Nippon Gallery

This event has ended.

The Nippon Gallery at The Nippon Club presents the exhibition of Hirado Ware & Mikawachi porcelain. The history of Mikawachi ware and the fascination of eggshell ware are introduced with resources both past and present.

Mikawachi was the capital of pottery as well as the fiefdom of Hirado domain. The wares produced in the Edo period (1603-1868) are called Hirado ware, while the wares produced after the 19th century are called Mikawachi ware. The first Hirado Tousyo was appointed by the feudal lord to establish one of the purveying kilns to Hirado government in 1637. Under the protection of the Hirado feudal administration, Hirado ware was significantly developed and prized as presentation wares for the shogun, the emperor and their families. Such ware and its production method were inaccessible for ordinary people until the end of the Edo period.

The sophisticated underglaze cobalt blue painted on the pure white porcelains, the reticulated openwork, the low relief decorations called “Okiage”, and the thin-walled porcelains can be seen

only in Mikawachi ware. Above all, extremely thin and lightweight porcelain wares called “eggshell wares” weighing only 30 grams fascinated Europeans, and became widely popular as one of the thinnest wares in the world. The eggshell wares are still preserved in foreign museums and viewable around the world. (*)

Hirado ware had been exported mainly by the Dutch since 1830, and the eggshell wares gained especially high popularity in the Netherlands. Some articles about eggshell wares are recorded in books and journals by people who visited Hirado in the 1800s. Also, the eggshell ware received a great acclaim in the article of London international exhibition in The Times. Around 1900, however, the potters in Mikawachi were giving up making eggshell porcelain due to change in demand, and eventually the production methods were lost, about 100 years ago. The thirteenth generation of Hirado Tousyo, Gakuei Fujimoto, focused on the high level of the lost production method of eggshell ware and its quality. He identified the materials, forming and firing techniques through countless tests and researches and, in 2006, finally revived the eggshell porcelain.
This exhibition presents the history of Hirado/Mikawachi ware, the production methods of eggshell wares which were rediscovered by Fujimoto, the antiques as well as modern porcelains representing today’s Mikawachi, and the outstanding techniques such as reticulated openwork, okiage (low relief) and sometsuke (blue and white/underglaze blue). Through the spectacular exhibits, you will experience the inherited soul and passion of great potters of Mikawachi.

The characteristics of Hirado/Mikawachi ware

 Eggshell ware:
Eggshell ware is extremely thin and light; it does not look like a porcelain at all. Also, the body
changes its color from unique pure white to soft color like a white bulb when irradiated.
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Sometsuke (blue and white/underglaze blue):
Sometsuke is a type of technique that decorates elaborate paintings on white porcelains with gosu pigment. The sensitive designs are painted one by one with a brush. The porcelains painted with Sometsuke technique show a spatial effect and perspective by adjusting the color density like no other. It is just like a cobalt blue ink-wash painting portrayed on pure white porcelains.
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Karako-e (literal translation of karako in English is “Chinese male child”):
Karako-e was introduced to Japan as a Chinese underglaze pattern and was used mostly in Mikawachi as a specified design for the purveying kiln to Hirado government. Reputedly, the karako-e wares on which seven children were painted were made exclusively for the shogun, the emperor and their families; five children for the feudal lord; and three children for the commoner.
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Reticulated openwork:
Reticulated openwork is a technique to put some lightness into porcelains. Openwork is applied
on body porcelains before firing.

 Okiage (low relief):
Okiage is not engraving, but decorates patterns by applying paste ceramics little by little. Hirado ware established this technique earlier than pate-sur-pate, which is a decoration style of Sevres ware manufactured in France.