Oribe Ware

織部 / Momoyama period– / Style / Ceramic Styles

A stoneware style fired in the Seto and Mino kilns from the Momoyama period into the early Tokugawa years, centred on utensils for the tea gathering. Surfaces stay rough and the glazes are few, simple and warm in colour. Copper green covers only part of the pot, and the reserved body carries iron brushwork.

Oribe Ware — Oribe square bowl, Mino ware, Edo period, 17th century — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain — Oribe square bowl, Mino ware, Edo period, 17th century — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

Oribe Ware — Oribe dish with foliate rim, Mino kilns, Momoyama to early Edo period, 17th century — Wikimedia Commons / CC0 — Oribe dish with foliate rim, Mino kilns, Momoyama to early Edo period, 17th century — Wikimedia Commons / CC0 · CC0

Oribe Ware — Oribe tea bowl, Japan, 17th century — Wikimedia Commons / CC0 — Oribe tea bowl, Japan, 17th century — Wikimedia Commons / CC0 · CC0

At a glance

Visual cues

Copper green covers only one side of the pot and stops at a visible line
The unglazed reserve carries brushed iron lines and geometric motifs
The surface stays rough and never reaches the smoothness of porcelain
Few colours are in play: the green glaze, the warm grey white body and the brown black of iron

Best used for

Designing a vessel or a package where the composition turns on colour covering only half the surface
Building product photography or graphics that show handmade unevenness instead of industrial uniformity

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Dictionary entry

Type: Write text with a brush and let stroke weight vary. Labels and names follow the same hand as the iron painting on the pot.
Composition: Split the field along the glaze line, giving one side to flat colour and the other to reserve and motif. Never draw that line with a straight edge.
Material: Lead with copper green, support it with the warm grey white of the body and the brown black of iron. Leave grain and brush marks rather than polishing the surface flat.
Caution: Adding distortion and irregularity on purpose makes the effort visible and drains the calm of a pot that was made to be used.
Further study: what the Seto and Mino kilns were firing in the Momoyama period / how a copper bearing glaze develops green in firing / the difference between forms demanded for the tea gathering and vessels made to be looked at

Related entries

Mingei (民藝)Shared effects: Calm / Intimacy.Compare Oribe Ware and Mingei
Roji (Tea Garden) (露地)Shared effects: Calm / Intimacy.Compare Oribe Ware and Roji (Tea Garden)

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Link: https://indexstyle.org/styles/oribe-ware
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