Colors of Kyoto: The Seifu Yohei Ceramic Studio (Cleveland Masterwork, 7)

New volume in the Cleveland Masterwork Series focuses on a studio of important late nineteenth through early twentieth-century Japanese ceramic artists. This is the first comprehensive look in English at the Seifu Yohei Ceramic Studio in Kyoto, from the Meiji period (1868-1912) to the mid Showa period (1926-89), the James and Christine Heusinger Collection at the Cleveland Museum of Art as its core material. The principal essay provides a biography of Seifu 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 contextualises 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, as well as a discussion of objects produced by the Seifu studio for sencha. This catalogue of a hundred works examines the wide variety of forms, decorative techniques and glazes that made the studio’s works unique.