Japanese craftsman re-creates a rare style of Song Dynasty porcelain that has been long lost in China
In 2007, the Japanese ceramic artist Kyosuke Hayashi brought his reproduction of rare chinaware to Beijing for an exhibition. His Chinese counterparts greatly admired the replica but were also a little bit embarrassed as no one in the country could re-create it.
The rare piece Hayashi reproduced is jian zhan, which literally means tea bowls fired in kilns. The craft originated in Southeast China's Fujian province during the Song Dynasty (960-1279).
China's ceramic experts commended Hayashi's reproduction for achieving a similar scale of beauty to the jian zhan ware the Song masters achieved.
"It is amazing that the potters 800 years ago had a very good command of the technique," says Hayashi, adding that ceramic-making methods reached their pinnacle in the Song Dynasty.
Hayashi's creations, referred to as yohen tenmoku in Japanese, with yohen literally meaning "changed by the fire/flame", are now in the collections of the Palace Museum in Beijing and the British Museum in London.
Born in 1962 in Toki, central Japan's Gifu prefecture－one of the country's major ceramic producers－Hayashi has won many awards for his pottery and ceramic works in Japan.
The jian zhan have patterns of starburst sparkles embedded in a black glaze. Within each star is a navy blue color of glistening mother-of-pearl－a shiny substance that forms the inside of certain mollusk shells.
When observers gaze long enough at the surface, it appears to resemble an expanse of stars drifting across the heavens on a summer's night.
People from the Song Dynasty had a reason for tea bowls of this type. They would grind compressed tea into a fine powder with a stone mill, and then whisk it into froth in bowls. The best teas were judged by the purity and whiteness of their froth.
