Hokujo

With round traces leftover from the pottery wheel and seams around the pots’ spouts and handles still clearly visible, Hokujo’s intriguing works combine simplicity and ease of use with the warm elegance of unprocessed, high-quality clay.

Born in Tokoname City in 1945, Hokujo was recognized 31 years later, in 1976, as a preserver of wheel-thrown teapot production methods and was designated an Intangible Cultural Property of Tokoname. The designation recognizes his status as a highly skilled practitioner of an art form that is of great historical and cultural value. Even in the ceramics and teapot capital of Tokoname, there are only five living artisans who have received this designation, and it is a high honor for any artist. Hokujo also works as a special lecturer in the ceramics department at the Aichi Prefectural College of Art, where he teaches teapot-manufacturing techniques to his students.

Though Hokujo is the son of a family that has been in the ceramics business for three generations, he is not afraid to take his own path. In the Tokoname tradition, red, unglazed pottery made from field clay is the norm, but after being encouraged by his parents to “make something different from what anyone else is making,” he switched to clay made from mountain soils, and has been using it for over thirty years.

While the normal firing process for Tokoname-style works requires a gas kiln at 1150 degrees Celsius, the mountain clay Hokujo uses is tough and cohesive, and is noted for its ability to stand up to even higher temperatures in the kiln. When the pieces are fired in a deoxygenated, highly reducing environment, the clay fuses, forming durable walls and giving the pieces their unique shine and patina.

“When you use unprocessed clay – clay that has its original, natural qualities intact – the high quality of that clay expresses itself in the piece,” Hokujo explains, revealing his fascination with the material that has become his trademark.