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Yanagi Sōetsu

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  • The Beauty of Everyday Things

    A Book by Yanagi Sōetsu
    1. ​​What is Folk Craft?​​
    2. ​​The Beauty of Miscellaneous Things​​
    3. ​​A Painted Karatsu as Food for Thought​​
    4. ​​Okinawa's Bashofu​​
    5. ​​Seeing and Knowing​​
    • craft
  • What is Pattern?

    Since a pattern is the depiction of the fundamental nature of an object, it is what remains of an object’s form after all that is unnecessary has been removed.

    Since a pattern is a crystallization, it is also an exaggeration. But it is not merely that; it is an accentuation of the truth.

    Yanagi Sōetsu, The Beauty of Everyday Things
    • mondegreens

    I first read the second paragraph as "an acceleration of the truth." Part of me likes that better.

  • Handicrafts and Sesshu

    I have almost never judged a work of art by first looking at its signature. This way of assessment holds no interest for me. If what I see is good, it is good with or without a seal.

    Whether it is a painting or a pot, you must first look at the thing itself.

    Yanagi Sōetsu, The Beauty of Everyday Things
    • fame
    • seeing
  • Okinawa's Bashofu

    Screen Shot 2020-12-28 at 4_43_36 PM.png

    The users of bashofu cloth are ordinary people, not the wealthy. It is used for the kimonos they wear every day. It is not something they buy with a highly appreciative aesthetic eye, comparing one piece with another as objects of art. It is bought as a mundane item and worn as a part of mundane life. Still, bashofu is beautiful just as it is. Here the idea that you get what you pay for does not apply. The cheap is the good and beautiful.

    Yanagi Sōetsu, The Beauty of Everyday Things
  • A Painted Karatsu as Food for Thought

    Screen Shot 2020-12-28 at 4_42_50 PM.png

    Recently there is a tendency to pursue distortion in art, but in the case of this jar, natural deformation has raised distortion to the level of spontaneous beauty.

    Yanagi Sōetsu, The Beauty of Everyday Things
    • art
    • beauty
    • imperfections
  • Woodblock Prints

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu

    It seems to me that many printmakers are suffering under a delusion. Looking at current trends, it appears that recent prints are simply copying fine art and painting. Some printmakers are working in the nanga style of painting. Others are attempting to reproduce the effects of oil. Some cleverly contrived prints are often difficult to distinguish from paintings done with a brush. The question arises: Why are these printmakers working in the medium of woodblock printing at all?

    For prints to follow in the footsteps of painting has very little meaning. The art of the brush and palette should be left to the brush and palette.

    1. ​​The fountainhead of beauty​​
    2. ​​The preliminary sketch​​
    • art
    • fashion
    • media
  • Seeing and Knowing

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu

    The results of intuition can be studied by the intellect, but the intellect cannot give birth to intuition.

    1. ​​Scholars and critics​​
    2. ​​Understanding its essence​​
    • knowledge
    • intuition
    • seeing
  • The Japanese Perspective

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu

    Generally speaking, the Western perception of art has its roots in Greece. For a long time its goal was perfection, which is particularly noticeable in Greek sculpture. This was in keeping with Western scientific thinking; there are no painters like Andrea Mantegna in the East. I am tempted to call such art ‘the art of even numbers’.

    In contrast to this, what the Japanese eye sought was the beauty of imperfection, which I would call ‘the art of odd numbers’. No other country has pursued the art of imperfection as eagerly as Japan.

    1. ​​The true meaning of tea​​
    2. ​​One receives with an empty hand​​
    3. ​​Only when it has ceased to be a pattern​​
    1. ​​The beauty of odd numbers​​
    • imperfections
  • The Beauty of Kasuri

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu
    Screen Shot 2020-12-28 at 5_09_48 PM.png
    1. ​​The beauty of odd numbers​​
    2. ​​Freedomless freedom​​
  • The Characteristics of Kogin

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu
    Screen Shot 2020-12-28 at 4_47_18 PM.png
    1. ​​This is how time is forgotten​​
    2. ​​There is no kogin that can be called poor​​
  • The Beauty of Miscellaneous Things

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu
    1. ​​By the handling of human hands​​
    2. ​​Devoid of ambition​​
    3. ​​The material finds the right object​​
    4. ​​Nothing that nature does not seek​​
  • Washi

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu

    Handmade washi (traditional Japanese paper) is replete with appeal. Looking at it, touching it, fills me with an indescribable sense of satisfaction. The more beautiful it is, however, the more difficult it is to put to use. Only a master of calligraphy could possibly add to its beauty; it is exquisite just as it is. This is wonderfully strange, for it is merely a simple material. Yet plain and undecorated as it is, it is alive with nuanced beauty. Good washi makes possible our most ambitious creative dreams.

    1. ​​To deprecate beauty itself​​
    • material
  • What is Folk Craft?

    An Essay from The Beauty of Everyday Things by Yanagi Sōetsu
    1. ​​Mingei​​
    2. ​​Feeble and ugly​​
    3. ​​An idyllic age of craftware​​
    4. ​​Our aesthetic sense has been severely impaired​​
    5. ​​The natural thing to do​​
    1. ​​The Nature and Art of Workmanship​​

See also:
  1. art
  2. imperfections
  3. seeing
  4. beauty
  5. intuition
  6. knowledge
  7. mondegreens
  8. fashion
  9. media
  10. craft
  11. utility
  12. material
  13. nature
  14. euphony
  15. constraints
  16. details
  17. function
  18. objects
  19. ambition
  20. form
  21. numbers
  22. freedom
  23. making
  24. time
  25. quality
  26. food
  27. zen
  28. patterns
  29. creativity
  30. drawing
  31. fame
  32. paper
  33. writing
  34. life
  35. critique
  36. understanding