SJ38 Vintage Japanese Faceted Pottery Vase, Seto Ware

(About Seto ware)

Seto ware is the pottery made in Seto city and nearby areas of modern Aichi prefecture. The Seto area was the center of pottery manufacture in the Kamakura period; Ko-seto (old seto) designates pieces made at this time. At the end of the Muromachi period the center of the pottery manufacture moved to nearby Mino. At that time, wares made in the area from Seto to Mino were called setoyaki. In the early Edo period, some pottery manufacture moved back to Seto. In 1822,

Kato Tamikichi (1722-1824) introduced sometsuke jiki (blue-and-white porcelain; see *sometsuke) from Arita in modern Saga prefecture, and this porcelain, called shinsei (new production) rather than the original Seto ware pottery, hongyou became standard.

In the Meiji period, Seto ware adapted Western techniques, gaining great popularity. In addition to plain seto, the Mino kilns also produced several types of Seto wares from the mid-16th century, including Seto-guro (black seto), and Ki-seto (yellow seto). Kiseto, fired at the same kilns as Shino and setoguro wares during the Momoyama period, featured "fried bean-curd" glaze, Aburagede developed in emulation of Chinese celadons.

It utilizes an iron-rich wood-ash glaze and is reduction fired at a high temperature to produce a celadon-like texture and bone color; in an oxygen-rich kiln, the minerals in the clay and glaze create a distinctive opaque yellow glaze.

Motifs are etched in the clay, then highlighted in green. Typical shapes, glazes and decoration all reflect functions in the tea ceremony or kaiseki meal. Setoguro wares were made by removing a black-glazed stoneware vessel directly from a hot kiln at the point of glaze maturation, and allowing it to cool in the open air. The sudden temperature change turned the thick glaze a deep glossy black.