Colors of Kyoto: The Seifū Yohei Ceramic Studio

by Maezaki Shinya and Sinéad Vilbar, Janice Hammond and Edward Hemmelgarn Curator of Japanese Art

This latest volume in the Cleveland Masterwork Series focuses on an important studio of late nineteenth- to mid-twentieth century Japanese ceramic artists.

The first comprehensive look in English at the Seifū Yohei ceramic studio in Kyoto, from the Meiji period (1868–1912) to the mid-Shōwa period (1926–1989), this book takes the James and Christine Heusinger Collection at the Cleveland Museum of Art as its core material. The principal essay provides a biography of Seifū Yohei III, the star of the studio and the first ceramist to be named an Imperial Household Artist, as well as an overview of the studio that contextualizes it in the world of literati painting, sencha (steeped green tea), and international trade. A second essay offers a brief history of porcelain production in Kyoto, along with a discussion of objects produced by the Seifū studio for sencha. The catalogue of one hundred works examines the wide variety of forms, decorative techniques, and glazes that made the studio’s works unique.