河井寬次郎

Born on August 24, 1890 (Meiji 23) in Yasugi-chō, Nogi-gun, Shimane prefecture (present-day Yasugi city). For generations his birth family had worked as master carpenters, and his brother Zenzaemon, seven years his senior, later inherited the family business. When Kanjirō was 16 years old advice from his maternal uncle, gynecologist Adachi Kenzaburō, made him decide to become a potter. In 1910 (Meiji 43), he was admitted without entrance examinations to the Ceramics Department of Tokyo Technical Higher School (present-day Tokyo Institute of Technology). At the time Itaya Hazan was leading its pottery courses. Kanjirō there met Hamada Shōji who entered the school three years later. In 1912 (Meiji 45), while still in school, he saw an exhibition of works by Bernard Leach that was held in conjunction with the Fourth Shirakaba exhibition (Sankaidō, Akasaka, Tokyo), and purchased a pot at the show. Later he visited Leach’s home in Sakuragi-chō, Ueno, Tokyo. In 1914 (Taishō 3) he graduated from school and was accepted as an engineer at Kyoto City Ceramic Research Institute, where he received technical direction from Komori Shinobu and others as he taught English to the students at the affiliated training school. In 1916 (Taishō 5) Hamada also began working at the Institute. With the support of Yamaoka Sentarō, director of the Kuhara Mining Company, he acquired overseas publications such as Robert Lockhart Hobson’s “Chinese Pottery and Porcelain: An Account of the Potter’s Art in China from Primitive Times to the Present Day” (note 1). Kawai and Hamada are said to have worked all the harder on their study of glazes. During this period he entered works in a succession of exhibitions, from the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce’s “Daisankai Zuan Oyobi Ōyōsakuhin Tenrankai” (Third Exhibition of Design and Applied Work, later re-named the Kōgeiten [Exhibition of Craft]) through the sixth holding of that re-named exhibition. In 1917 (Taishō 6) he resigned from the Institute and went to work as Kiyomizu Rokubei V’s technical advisor. In 1920 (Taishō 9) thanks to Yamaoka’s support, he took over Rokubei V’s kiln at Kanei-chō, Gojōzaka, Kyoto, changed the kiln’s name to Shōkeiyō, and made it his home and production site. Both his residence and pottery studio were located in the same grounds, and the kiln was a shared kiln also used by other potters. He rebuilt his home after the 1937 Muroto Typhoon, producing the design himself while his older brother supervised its construction. In 1973 (Shōwa 48) that house was opened to the public as Kawai Kanjirō’s House. In 1921 he held his first solo exhibition “Kawai Kanjirō-shi Sōsaku Tōji Tenkan” (Kyobashi Takashimaya, Tokyo), displaying works he had made with full awareness of such Chinese and Korean ceramics, “ȳurikō” 釉裏紅 (underglaze copper red), “taihi” type tenmoku, and “mishima-de”. During the preparations for that solo exhibition he met Kawakatsu Ken’ichi, then publicity department head for Takashimaya’s Tokyo Branch, who would become a close lifelong friend. That meant that Kanjirō primarily used Takashimaya stores for his later solo exhibitions. The following year Takashimaya’s Art Department published “Shōkeiyō Daiishū” (First Compendium of Shōkeiyō), featuring ten of Kawai’s major works. Ceramics scholar Okuda Seiichi wrote in his foreword for the volume, “Shōkeiyō suddenly surfaced in a corner of the ceramics world.” It was then through introductions from Okuda that Kawai built relationships with his early period patrons, Iwasaki Koyata, Kuroita Katsumi, and Hosokawa Moritatsu. Conversely, critical reviews appeared in magazine critique columns, such as “what is particularly off-putting is the fact that while the shapes reveal technical prowess, rather than clearly enjoying his talent, regrettably one is completely unable to get a sense of artistic loftiness.” (“Kawai Kanjirō Tōjiten,” “Chūō Bijutsu”, Volume 9, Issue 6, June 1923). Such critiques of Kawai indicate that his stance differed from that of the critics of the day who always sought an artistic expression in ceramics. In 1923, Kawai surveyed the ancient Egyptian and Oriental ceramic shards collected by Kojima Torajirō in Kurashiki, and the following year helped with the display of these items in the “Gaihō Kotōki Tenrankai” (Antique Foreign Ceramic Exhibition) held at the Imperial Gift Museum of Kyoto (present-day Kyoto National Museum). During that exhibition he gave a lecture titled “The Principles of Ceramics”. He cited Song dynasty celadon and Egyptian pottery as examples in that lecture, stating “beauty appears with all of its force,” and “the superb beauty of anonymous everyday pottery” (Kawai Kanjirō, “Tōki no Shōsanshin” (“Onshi Kyoto Hakubutsukan Kōenshū,” Vol. 1, 1925, pp. 10–15). These comments reveal that his interests already overlapped with what would become the folk craft movement. Those interests were stimulated by the wide array of ancient ceramics which he had studied up until that time. In 1924 (Taishō 13) Hamada, newly returned from England, stayed at Kawai’s house and through Hamada, Kawai got to know Yanagi Sōetsu (Muneyoshi). The three men set off on a survey of the folk sculptor Mokujiki Shōnin across different regions of Japan. During that trip they created the term, “minshūteki kōgei,” literally folk crafts, which was shortened to “mingei”, folk crafts. In 1926, Kawai, Tomimoto Kenkichi, Hamada, and Yanagi published their “Prospectus for the Establishment of the Japan Folk Crafts Museum”. That same year Kuroita and Naitō Konan called for a group of Kawai patrons, and they provided the support necessary for him to explore his creative direction. In 1929 (Shōwa 4) he held another solo exhibition at Takashimaya which displayed many of the everyday use wares that he had produced and gradually shown at the exhibition-sales organized by that patron group. The works of this period reveal major changes in his production, from the previously noted Chinese and Korean ceramic-influenced works to a blending and mix of techniques from other regions. His expressive range now encompassed English slipware-inspired slip decoration, the use of expansive plants and flower motifs, and a broader range of vessel shape, design, and glaze use. In terms of his connection to the Mingei Movement, Kawai can be seen as an essential presence in the network that Yanagi built as he started the movement in Kyoto. As they set out on collecting trips throughout Japan Kawai encountered the techniques and forms employed at different kilns, and his use of such information can be seen in his own works. Further, Kawai contributed articles to the Mingei Movement’s “Kōgei” magazine from its inaugural edition in 1931 (Shōwa 6). He primarily wrote for that magazine and the postwar magazine “Mingei”. In particular, he focused on his thoughts and writing activities since he could not fire ceramics during the Pacific War. In the postwar years he published essays on his childhood memories and other themes. Starting around 1949 (Shōwa 24) he began to work with irregularly shaped jars, dishes, and other vessel forms, with bold designs worked in “neriage (marbled clay)” along with “dorohakeme (slip brushstrokes)”, “sanshoku uchigusuri (splashed polychrome glaze)”, and “hekiyū (turquoise blue glaze)” glaze and slip effects. Kawai’s stylistic changes are often divided into early, middle, and late periods, and these works fall into his late period category. Starting around 1950 (Shōwa 25) he became fully involved in wood carving, creating wood sculptures on the theme of hands. Kawai declined “lmportant Intangible Cultural Property” status and other national cultural awards, and he primarily displayed his works in solo exhibitions. Amid such a career, works drawn from Kawakatsu’s own collection, including “Jar with Grass and Flower Design, Iron Glazed and Copper Red Glaze” (1935, The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto) entered in the 1937 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris and “Flask with Grass and Flower Design on White Ground” (1939, The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto) entered in the Eleventh Milan Triennale in 1957 (Shōwa 32) were both awarded Grand Prizes at their respective exhibitions. “Tricolor Jar” (whereabouts unknown), a Kawai work chosen by Koyama Fujio for display in the Third International Ceramic Exhibition (Prague, Czechoslovakia), was awarded a Gold Medal. Kawai died in 1966 (Shōwa 41) in Kyoto. The Kawai works collected by Kawakatsu over his lifetime were donated to the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto in 1968 (Shōwa 43). With the addition of later donations, a total of 425 works form the Kawakatsu Collection at that Museum. Kawakatsu called them “a chronological dictionary of his works,” (Kawakatsu Ken’ichi, “Fumetsu no honō ni sasagu” (Dedicated to the Immortal Flame) in The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, eds., “Kawai Kanjiro: The Kawakatsu Collection in The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto”, Mitsumura Suiko Shoin Publishing Co., Ltd, 2019, p. 15). (Miyagawa Tomomi / Translated by Martha J. McClintock) (Published online: 2024-03-06) Note 1. Probably, Hobson, R. L, “Chinese Pottery and Porcelain: An Account of the Potter’s art in China from Primitive Times to the Present Day”, Cassell, 1915.