en-us-Udagawa

Udagawa was born in Hagi and made pottery for ten years and then built an independent oven in the distant area in a nearby county completely surrounded by nature he wanted to face his work as battles with the thought of being embraced by the blue of the sky, the blue of the water, the blue of the mountain.

He died at a young age of 47.

His work by Udagawa was often modeled with bamboo, often hammering, and his enamel was mainly composed of ash and straw. However, the ashes of Udagawa used have often been processed with hardwood without using chemical fertilizers. It is thought that in turn this ash created by him could be a perfect pesticide. Udagawa Hosei did not like to create works of the same form.

After graduating from high school, built the Tanmyo-zan kiln with his elder brother, Seikoku in 1982 Built his own Hakuto-zan kiln and around 1983 held a solo exhibition andcreated several variations of Hagi ware.

From Yamaguchi Shinkansen if you start from Shin Yamaguchi Station, on the inner side of the Seto Sea there is a place called the city of Hōfu (防府市, Hōfu-shi) a former village of Oto. It seems that thiscity was very crowded since the middle of the Edo era and a reference on postal exchanges along the Sanyo Road. Nearby there is only one mountain of 300 m in height, and no other high mountains around.

You can recognize it because of the view on the Inner Sea of ​​Kasado bay which is wonderful.

Its name is Okiyama 沖 山 Oshima (mountain Omiyama and Gumi) and by the surroundings you can find clay made of granite that has gradually altered with an high plasticity important for the Hagi pottery. From the side facing the inner sea of ​​Seto, the Hagi terrain is about 60 kilometers. A long time ago, it was horse-ridden or transported by sea passing through the Kanmon Strait Kanmonkyo Bridge (关门 桥)

The sandy, clayey soil makes the clays unique. It is said that before the Hagi Yaki existed, at that time the clays of the plains were mixed with those of the high ground. However, since the land of lowland has little iron, it burns little, so it is often modeled with a bottom soil mixture of the surrounding islands that give a golden and reddish ones. In this way several very interesting reactions occur in the oven. The same characteristics that can be found in the basaltic rock formed by lava. The result is given by viscosity due to the presence of iron, but also by the non-refractory soil.

Udagawa has often used mainly the main road and island terrain and In his works the ground was finely chopped by placing this island land, as his works, in my opinion always tended to be a dark glaze. So many came to the conclusion that the "finely chopped" was the trick. Salinity can not be excluded yet. Apply this rather dark base from the ground as a make-up, once dried, they could apply a ground glaze derived from the result of ash ashes.

All this with lots of experience was the characteristics of Hagi-yaki for years, making it easier to carry out enamel changes during his cooking. During the Meiji era, Hagiyaki lost the protection of the Mori clan which was in a strong state of decline. During the Showa era, during many trials and errors by making Hagi Ware Portteries developed the "White Hagi" which is said to be like the snow obtained with a soft flame.

Thanks to this various talents like Udagawa, Miwa, Hagi-yaki has been recognized as "the father of Hagiyaki revitalization" In the end, in the final era of Showa, the boom came and the number of tourists increased and many ovens were built.

Many potters of the time perhaps misunderstood the "seven phases of Hagi" as sweet changes.