Page 414 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

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COVERED JAR CALLED "IMOGASHIRA" bamboo ladle used to dip the cold water. Imo- TSUBO STORAGE JAR
(POTATO HEAD) gashira was originally made as a small covered i$th century
storage jar. Like the
bowls
Korean peasant
c. 1500 imported to Japan, it was adopted, or rather Japanese
Japanese "found" to be a useful part of the Tea Cere- Tamba ware: stoneware with ash glaze
2
stoneware with ash glaze mony some fifty to a hundred years after its height 31.7 fi2 /2J
height 20.3 (8) manufacture. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
references: Faulkner and Impey 19^1, 23-26, 45-51; The roughly incised markings in the glaze are
Tokyo 1985 asymmetrical enough to satisfy the new "Tea Near Osaka, just over the first range of mountains
Eisei Bunko, Tokyo taste," and the glaze is rough-textured enough to to the north, lies Tamba, site of one group of the
suggest rocks and to subtly complement the envi-
ronment and other utensils of Cha no yu. The so-called Six Old Kilns. Like the other kilns of
Although its precise place of origin is not known, mere fact of being named attests the high regard this category, Tamba began production with Late
this jar seems likely to have been made in the in which a Tea vessel was held by its owner, and Heian (897-1185) and Kamakura (1185-1333) ren-
Seto-Mino area, respectively east and north of the deliberately colloquial and astringent name ditions of Sue and Sanage type stonewares, reach-
Nagoya. Certainly the dark-glazed Seto wares of Imogashira was part of the ambience bestowed on ing peak production during the Muromachi period
the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries influenced this well-known Tea treasure by the Hosokawa (1333-1573). Excellent wares of the old types are
Mino production in the earlier stages of its devel- daimyo family in which it descended. S.E.L. still produced there today.
opment. In shape this jar somewhat resembles The Tamba body is more homogeneous and less
Seto ware jars made in the Kamakura period contaminated with flecks of quartz than Shigaraki
(1185-1333) under the influence of the Chinese ware (cat. 261), and the accidental ash glaze, often
guan shape. runny, seems greener-tinged and slightly more
The date of manufacture is likewise approxi- viscous than on wares of the other Six Kilns.
mate, but Imogashira is a transitional vessel, Decoration is uncommon but "kiln marks" or
coming somewhere between the rough farm uten- logos occur more often, usually on the body at the
sils originally produced by the Six Old Kilns (in- shoulder. Tamba shapes are not so full-blown as
cluding Seto) and the wares made by these same either Shigaraki or Tokoname or even Bizen, and
kilns for the Tea Ceremony in the late sixteenth the rims of the jars are usually rather large and
and early seventeenth centuries. It was apparently thin, though less prominent than those charac-
not made as a cold-water jar (mizusashi) for the teristic of Tokoname. In all respects Tamba ware
emerging Tea Ceremony (Cha no yu), its mouth satisfied late medieval Tea taste for unpretentious
being awkwardly small to accommodate the farm/folk products. S.E.L.

TOWARD CATHAY 4*3