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Title: The Unknown Craftsman: A Japanese Insight into Beauty
ISBN: 0870119486
Author:
Soetsu Yanagi
Publicate Date: 1990-01-15
Publish: 1990-01-15
List Price: $35.00
Average Customer Rating: 5.0
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $20.01
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $15.05
Amazon Merchant Price: $23.10
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| Customer Review: |
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1: A beautiful set of fine essays
I know very little about pottery but I have spent a lot of reading time studying Buddhism and specifically Zen and its underlying life philosophy. I found these essays to be especially beautiful in showing the way for artists and craftsmen to embrace 'no-mindedness' in their creative efforts, effacing their own egos and personalities in order to let nature flow through them in the creative process.
'Objects born, not made' is an especially humbling concept to consider. To think that the objects are 'born' through nature and the craftsman is mostly a mere vehicle for that, his signature on 'his' work completely unncessary, the object itself being the 'signature'.
I was pleased to see in the next to last essay in this collection, the author's references to the 'Way of Tea' and its demonstration of the same principles embodied in this work. I strongly recommend 'The Book of Tea' by Okakuro Kakuzo as an adjunct to this material, amplifying his ideas and further reflecting the beauty of Zen.
My only objection, and this is really minor, is this work's subtitle 'A Japanese Insight into Beauty'. As many Japanese are not Buddhist and do not embrace the Zen philosophy, nor understand it, this insight is not so much 'Japanese' as 'Zen'. Thus the finer subtitle could have been 'A Zen Insight into Beauty'.
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2: great for the study of craft in Japan
This book was written by the father of the crafts movement in Japan, Yanagi Soetsu. He encouraged the Japanese to appreciate their national arts at a time of modernization and Westernization in Japan. The book covers areas of craft such as cermaics and lacquers.
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3: A book you HAVE to read, and you'll CRAVE to own...
This remarkable, must-have book is half superb pictures of various Oriental objects of manufacture become recognized as quintessentially "unselfconscious" objects of art (the one of the "top" teacup in Japan alone is worth the book's price), and half short but very eye-opening essays on various dimensions of beauty, creativity, and the aesthetic experience.
MUCH generally accepted superficiality (and downright phoniness) in the field of art appreciation is solidly debunked here (read the other reviews for more on the author's qualifications, plus some relatively piddling criticism from a few experts).
The pieces on the degeneration of the so-called "classic" Tea Ceremony and the cult of deliberate "beauty of ugliness" will provide much food for thought. Anyone interested in beauty and its representations will do very well indeed to acquire this truly irreplaceable read.
I too wish the book were 10 times as long! I believe it was out of print for awhile -- great to see it available new from Amazon at a reasonable price.
Oh -- on second thought, DO just buy this title, rather than borrow one first -- my copy is so heavily marked up that it would have been agony to have read a library copy....
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4: Humble pie never tasted so good
Soon after getting into custom furniture and cabinetmaking as a profession, I had come to that point where I began to tie my sense of self-worth to what other people thought of my work. Even worse, I began to feel that I was in a competition with my fellow woodworkers. Not only did I want their approval, but I thought I must strive to be better than them or I wouldn't achieve distinction (and therefore success). Then, via my explorations into Buddhism, I came across this book. It presented me with a heaping, much-needed serving of humble pie by telling me things like: "A beautiful work of art...is the work of a man who is not (bound to) either beauty and ugliness or even to himself." Yanagi was talking about the craftsman of Japan's past who, working with "total disengagement", created some of the most beautiful art objects the world has ever seen. This work was never signed because these were the products of craftsman who "made no effort to express their individuality through the medium of things; (instead) they produced things through the medium of man". As my understanding of Buddhism deepened, so didn't the import of these words. The bottom line was that I relaxed, I let myself enjoy the process and I let the objects I made speak for themselves. Humble pie never tasted so good.
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5: An Aesthetics Bible!
Yanagi's words are so dense, packed, and rich with meaning. He has keen insights into what real 'seeing' is, and how necessary it is in discerning beauty. But Yanagi's words run beyond insight, and have some of that deep ring of eternal 'Truth' to them. I highly recommmend this book to anyone wanting to learn more about what true 'seeing' is, and how it relates to the perception of beauty.
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