Shoji Hamada, Master Potter

Shoji Hamada has a global reputation as the modern Japanese artist-potter par excellence and as one of the most important core members of the Mingei (Japanese Folkcraft) movement. He is porbably best known in Britain for his collaboration with Bernard Leach at St Ives in the early 1920s; their lifelong friendship has been regarded by many as the epitome of the meeting of East and West.

The texts by English and Japanese authors provide much new source material as well as a critical appraisal of Hamada as a pioneer of modern craft. Sixty illustrations encompass many pieces from public and private collections in Japan, England and Wales never previously reproduced; they range from teabowls, teapots and vases displaying Hamada’s characteristic brushwork, through to magnificent platters which show off his virtuosity with clay and glaze at its finest.