Mino Yaki
What is “Mino Yaki”?
Mino Yaki (Mino Ware) is a generic term for ceramics/pottery produced in regions crossing through portions of the Tono Region (Toki City, Tajimi City, Mizunami City, Kani City) in Gifu Prefecture, Japan.
On July 22 1978, Mino Yaki was designated as traditional craftwork by Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
The Tono Region is Japan’s greatest center of ceramic/pottery production, and amongst this region’s cities, Toki City ranks number one in Japan for its ceramic production volume.
The history of Mino Yaki
The roots behind Mino Yaki can be traced as far back as prior to Japan’s Heian period.
The techniques behind Sueki (hard, turquoise earthenware), which originated from the Korean Peninsula sometime around the middle of Japan’s Kofun period (the beginning of the western 5th century), later developed in the Heian period to produce pottery called Shirashi which employed the use of enamel glaze consisting of plant ash. During Japan’s subsequent Kamakura and Muromachi periods, this style of fire-shaped pottery branched off and evolved into glaze-free Yamacha Wan and yellowish brown and yellow green-glazed Koseto as well as into Tetsuyu (iron glaze) consisting of iron oxide.
The Muromachi period also saw the onset of the single-chamber kiln oven referred to as Ogama, and this preceded a further boom of popularity for pottery creation primarily in the Tono region of Gifu Prefecture.
This craft later saw the improvement of iron glazing and the resultant birth of Kiseto, a form of pottery whose iron glaze produces a characteristically warm shade of yellow. This was followed in the Momoyama period (Tensho period: 1573-1592) by the onset of Setoguro, a type of dark-glazed and plain black pottery.
It was around this time that the popularity and prevalence of cha no yu (Japanese tea ceremony) and the inception of the world of tea pottery had been brought about by feudal lords of Japan’s Sengoku (Warring States) period such as Nobunaga Oda and Hideyoshi Toyotomi as well as by tea masters which included the likes of Sen no Rikyu and Furuta Oribe.
A reflection of the tastes and preferences of such renowned tea experts can be seen in subsequent creations such as Haishino molded with glaze created via the combination of grey glaze and feldspar as well as Shino made solely from feldspar glaze.
(Shino yaki)
Feldspar, a mineral found within most rock formations, is largely white in hue.
Some forms of feldspar, however, consist of other colors as well. Existing examples of the wide diversity of such feldspar, which range from rarities in terms of composition and classification to minerals used in toothpaste, include sanidine which contains the gem known as moonstone as well as anorthite (grey feldspar) which is comprised of semi-precious sunstone.
After Shino came the birth of Oribe, an innovative design marked by Japan’s very first brush writing pattern conceived through the guidance and teachings of Furuta Oribe.
(Oribe yaki)
It has been surmised that the background behind the inception of Oribe-yaki lies in Japan’s introduction of the climbing kiln (a slanted stair-shaped configuration connecting multiple firing kilns) originating from China and utilized as a manufacturing process for Karatsu-yaki (a type of pottery created after the beginning of modern times in the present-day eastern regions of Saga Prefecture and the northern regions of Nagasaki Prefecture) as well as in influences stemming from similarities with Karatsu patterns. Excavation research conducted in 1989, in fact, has led to presumptions that Oribe-yaki had been the primary trend for pottery-making in Kyoto, the capital of Japan during the initial stages of this pottery style at that time.
After Oribe came a process involving the mid-Edo period combination of feldspar and glaze and the concurrent process of stamp-molding (manufacturing through inlaying in base material) along with Ofukei, a form of pottery created with modeled pasted patterns. Through such processes and evolution, pottery production initiated in the final days of the Edo period had developed into the current major field of kiln pottery making known as Mino-yaki today.