Shigaraki Hi-matsuri: Exploring the Intersection of Ceramics, Art, and Academics in Japan
Last month, I attended to a summer festival called the Shigaraki Fire Festival (Hi-matsuri) in Shiga. That was my second time after last year. The people of Shigaraki, one of the Six Ancient Kilns of Japan and still renowned as a center of ceramics, give thanks to the God of fire, which is essential for ceramics, and pray for safety.
The festival is held annually on the fourth Saturday of July and consists of a summer torch procession of 700 people (including children) carrying wooden torches from Shingu Shrine to Atago Shrine on a hill. They build a big bonfire at the parking lot of the traditional industrial center, and a traditional drum band performs throughout the festival.
Since 2018, I have been conducting research in the ceramic town of Shiga. My interest in the area was piqued after King Houndekpinkou participated in the artist-in-residency program at The Shigaraki Ceramic Culture Park. Despite growing up in Kyoto, which is adjacent to Shigaraki, I had little knowledge of the town at the time. I wondered how an international ceramics art residency of this scale could operate for over 30 years. This research question led me to investigate the modern and contemporary history of Shiga as part of my doctoral research on the globalization and decolonization of contemporary art and ceramics. I have since conducted several field research in the area.
Shigaraki is renowned for its over-1000-year tradition of ceramics, particularly its tea wares. However, since the 19th century, it has developed modern industrial ceramics, famous for its large-scale production of items such as fire blazers, flower pots, and architectural tiles. This industrial success has brought people cutting-edge fine art and design to this small town.
The industrial elites in Shigaraki, who were leaders of the town, recognized the importance of the artistic or cultural aspect of ceramics engineering. They invited artists or avant-garde ceramicists to Shigaraki, sometimes as advisers and sometimes as clients for large-scale ceramic artworks, in order to cultivate and sophisticate the ceramic industry. Younger people had the opportunity to learn design or art from these artists and some were so inspired that they became artists themselves and followed in their footsteps. In Shigaraki, modern industrial ceramics have generated a circulation of art, design, and ceramics. After the 1980s, this circulation connected with art people or intellectuals of Kyoto and Osaka, and cultural capitals like the Seibu joined the group. This network led to the realization of the Shigaraki Ceramic Culture Park and Ceramics Festival in the 1990s.
When people discuss ceramics in Japan, the conversation often revolves around the modern institutionalized craft and ceramic art (kogei/togei) or the Western art-craft dichotomy. However, even after modernization, there are rich practices and histories outside of the art-craft system. Though these are often written out of “art history,” they are essential lineage to appreciate contemporary ceramic art.
I have obtained certain answers of research focused on SCCP. Now, I plan to move to the next phase of gaining a closer insight into the town and its local community and studying lineages that were not integrated into infrastructures like SCCP. I expect this process will provide me with clues on how to disseminate my research results, make scholarly knowledge public, and what kind of sharing would be truly meaningful to the community.
