Works from the Otani Pottery Studio, Japan
Some lovely imagery from the Otani Pottery Studio, a website that I stumbled across this morning on my travels, very pure and simple, it was a perfect way to start my day. The Otani studio was actually founded by husband and wife team Tetsuya and Momoko Otani in 2008. It’s located in Shigaraki, one of the 6 oldest pottery sites in Japan, they live in the middle of the mountains with their 3 daughters, 2 cats and 1 dog.
A lot of my focus today will be on Tetsuya Otani, but Momoko has some incredible work in her portfolio as well, I love her balance and poise. She’s also a dab hand with the colour and has a sense of pattern and texture that I’ve not seen in many other potters. But Tetsuya on the other hand is at the other end of the scale in my opinion, his works focus purely on functionality and he likes his finished objects to be easy to wash, easy to store in the home and to look aesthetically pleasing on the eye.
On their about page he explains a bit behind his process as a creative and his mentality, he says “My works may at first glance give the impression that they are a bit inorganic (cold or austere); however, as you look closely, you can feel the soft lines and warm touches of glaze that only can only be created by hand”. I have to agree, these are all really beautiful and functional, you can never get tired of looking at them and are perfect around the home. Maybe “super normal” in a lot of ways (yep, there’s those words again! Excuse my obsession). Tetsuya also says that he imagines how it will look when food is on a plate or tea is inside the cup, or in what kind of situation it will be used in, I think this is extremely important especially then you are producing ceramics.
Overall a great set with an amazing website to match, the link below will give you all the inspiration you need for this morning. Scroll down to check out my favourite selection of works from Tetsuya Otani.