Part 1: Saturday, August 26 － Monday, October 9

　Part 2: Saturday, October 21 － Sunday, December 10

 

Approximately 800 years have elapsed since the arrival of matcha tea-drinking culture in Japan and roughly 500 years since the advent of chanoyu (the “tea ceremony”). Over many centuries, the vessels used to partake of matcha have undergone considerable transition and seen a tremendous burgeoning in their diversity. When matcha was first introduced to Japan from 12th-century Song China, it — and therefore tea bowls (chawan) — were used exclusively in Buddhist ceremonies at Zen temples. Most of those bowls were produced in China, at the Jiàn Kiln (Kenyō) in Fujian Province, and were called tenmoku (天目) in Japan. In the Japan of those days, the word chawan (meaning “tea bowl/s”, today) was not yet a generic term but referred specifically to what we would today classify as porcelain tea bowls, especially those featuring underglaze blue design (sometsuke), not tenmoku. (In China, their land of origin, tenmoku were known by a different name: Jiānzhǎn [建盞], meaning “Jiàn cups/bowls”.)

Matcha drinking eventually spread beyond the walls of Zen temples and was also taken up by the military aristocracy and by monks of other Buddhist sects. As matcha became a favored beverage among growing segments of society, a tea-drinking game called honhicha emerged, in which participants would taste a variety of teas and try to guess where the tea leaves had been produced. Following honhicha, the popularity of a number of different ways of enjoying matcha ebbed and waned until settling for some time on the shishu-jippuku (四種十服; lit.: “four kinds, 10 sips”) style. Shishu-jippuku events in the 14th century came to be known as cha yoriai (tea gatherings), and most of the tea bowls employed at these gatherings are thought to still have been of the tenmoku type. Time marched on, and by the early 16th century, cha yoriai had evolved into what is considered to be the early stages of today’s tea ceremony, or chanoyu. Throughout these developing trends in matcha-drinking — including some time after the foundation of chanoyu — tea bowls remained, by and large, of the tenmoku type, with a relatively modest presence of Celadon and underglaze-blue bowls, also imported from China.

The establishment of the austere wabi-suki tenets of chanoyu (underlying what came to be known as the wabi-cha style of chanoyu), late in the 16th century, was accompanied by re-examination of the tools and utensils hitherto used, resulting in a decisive move away from many Chinese objects, in favor of those reflecting Korean and Japanese tradition. Tea bowls were no exception, with the once highly favored tenmoku dropping in popularity from the second half of the 1500s until, by the start of the 17th century, they had nearly entirely disappeared from the chanoyu scene in Japan.

From that point onward, while each new era brought with it a certain degree of change in tea-bowl style, we can see in the chakaiki (written records of tea ceremonies made by hosts or guests) of the day that, in broad terms, bowls of Korean and Japanese provenance each accounted for about half of the tea bowls used at chanoyu gatherings, while those of Chinese and other origins make only scant appearance. Korean items and Japanese items, too, however, would themselves undergo evolution.

As we enter the 18th century, social spheres that practice chanoyu are expanding, pottery production in Japan is flourishing, and tea bowls of a wide variety of styles from all around the country are now regular features at tea ceremonies. This is also a time when Grand Masters (iemoto) — heads of different schools of chanoyu — were exerting growing influence. Grand Masters would select specific styles of bowls (and other chanoyu utensils) that they found particularly to their liking, and those privileged implements would thereafter proudly bear the epithet: “Preferred by Grand Master So-and-so”. Grand Masters also began engaging in the creation of their own hand-modeled tea bowls, a trend that continued with subsequent generations of Grand Masters and was soon avidly joined by daimyo (feudal lords), monks and accomplished chanoyu practitioners. Many such bowls have survived to today.

When the centuries-old Edo Shogunate was toppled in the latter half of the 19th century and the newly-formed Meiji government ushered in an era of modernization, chanoyu (and other traditional arts) fell out of vogue, and the practice of chanoyu went into decline. After not long, however, an innovative wave of modern chanoyu practitioners (kindai sukisha) arose, sparking renewed enthusiasm throughout the chanoyu world in Japan. These avid aficionados adopted the practice of occasionally making their own hand-modeled tea bowls, while also introducing into chanoyu unprecedented items, such as Buddhist implements and products from a wider range of foreign countries than ever before. Tea bowls were selected based on a fresh sense of the times, and bowls of Chinese origin — including tenmoku, which had been largely disregarded since the introduction of the wabi-suki philosophy — began to once again garner attention and show up at chanoyu gatherings.

In the latter half of the 20th century, expansion of the Grand Master system reached new heights. Never in chanoyu’s centuries-old history had there been so many people practicing Tea — and the majority were women. One result of this trend was a respectful distancing from the type of bowls that had long been popular — austere bowls evocative of the wabi-sabi philosophy and large bowls with a commanding presence — and a tendency toward tea bowls of a more diminutive size, often with charming decorations.

Today, all of the tea bowl styles briefly described above are in use. So, although we use the single term “tea bowl” to describe the vessel with which matcha is normally drunk, it is important to keep in mind that what the tea bowl, itself, actually is has undergone considerable modification. Today, tea bowls display great diversity, reflecting their evolution over time and the changing demographics of the main protagonists in the chanoyu world of the day.
Ultimately, tea bowls (chawan) are vessels for drinking matcha and, as such, are sought after for their suitability in fulfilling that purpose — in terms of their form, size and the overall feeling they evoke.


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