Trip to Okayama, Japan #2
Crafting Beauty in a Tranquil Setting
On the second day of my trip to Okayama, I had the pleasure of visiting Masato Miura, another incredibly talented artisan. His workshop is about an hour's drive from Okayama Station, nestled in a peaceful landscape of small mountains and rice fields. Right next to his home, Miura-san’s workshop feels part of this serene environment, with goats and chickens roaming nearby, almost like a mini petting zoo. Currently, Miura-san creates both Sue ware and Bizen pottery. In Bizen ware, the iron in the clay reacts during firing to produce deep, rich reds, with subtle variations in tone depending on how the flames move inside the kiln. The delicate shapes and unique colors of his rice bowls are simply stunning, each piece with its own distinct personality.
Miura-san is still exploring the techniques with Sue ware, and the results can sometimes be unexpected. Managing the kiln’s temperature and oxygen levels requires a delicate balance, and only about half of the pieces meet his exacting standards. Despite this, he finds the challenge exciting, learning from each firing and using those lessons to inspire his next creative endeavor. One particularly rare piece he showed me had a soft, greenish tint—a truly unique result.
"Because it's interesting."
When I asked Miura-san if he ever had doubts about becoming a potter, he smiled gently and said, "Well, it would be a lie to say I had none, but I always thought things would work out somehow." And when I inquired what had kept him going for nearly 30 years, his answer was simple: "Because it's interesting."
The word "interesting" holds great depth. It can describe the pleasure of entertainment or the satisfaction of solving a complex math problem. For artisans like Miura-san, it’s certainly the latter. Kneading clay, shaping forms, monitoring the kiln’s temperature during firing, and then learning from the pieces that don’t make it while delighting in the ones that surprise him—this entire process makes his work "interesting." Even building his anagama kiln, which took months to complete, was part of that joy.
