Tobe Ware & Objet d’Art： Inside Ohigashi Alyne’s Japanese Pottery Studio

Real color of the ocean I saw. Yeah, it's very nice. Today we're here in Ehime Prefecture in the city of Tobe and we're visiting Higashikyon. The artist here, Aline, is actually from the Philippines but she uses traditional Tobe pottery clay to make her original pieces. She's especially known for her botanical designs and you can already see her garden is very beautiful. So let's go meet her. Thanks so much for having us. Hi, I'm so glad you're here. Thank you. I'm Rebecca from Team Musubi. Oh really? I'm Aline. Aline Ohigashi. Nice to meet you. So nice to meet you. Right now we don't have so much stock on the shelves because everything was sold out. The whole gallery seems empty but next week it'll be full again. You can see some here. So these are coffee cups and this is the newest design here. It's a poppy actually. This is one of Aline's most popular pieces at Musubi Kiln. It's her PS Blue Donburi Bowl and what's so beautiful about this is it looks like the light is shining through the petals of these flowers. It's a very textured and detailed blue and then we have this beautiful pop of brightness from the touches of gold. So let's talk to Aline some more So how did you come up with this concept? Actually, when you make a design it has to be original. So the method itself is actually very Japanese but it's called kayazume. I'm using washizume for this. It's a typical Japanese paper and the flower I use for this is the forget-me-not which is a very small flower. It has a very nice blue color in the middle or yellow and then I just count the number of petals which has and I made it bigger. So actually this size is probably 10 times the real flower and then if you see the plate then I use five flowers and for this bowl I use seven flowers. And also if you notice there are gold dots on the drawing. It is very different when it has a gold or not because gold makes you feel something like you're rich. Actually it's just an inner feeling and when you look at the design it will let you feel like you're happy. Yeah. And the whole design itself is the the concept of these flowers. It will make you happy when you look at it. I've changed. So pretty. Thank you. You designed this yourself? Yes, yes. From the details and everything. So may I ask you a few questions about, I want to ask about your life and your work. Okay, it's okay. Okay. Okay. I grew up in the Philippines. I'm a Filipina and I came here to Japan at the age of 22. 22. So I'm now 64 going 65. So I've been here for a long time longer than I was in the Philippines. So as a child I grew up in the Philippines but as a mature person I grew up here in Japan. So I'm probably half in my lifetime and then my husband was a potter, a ceramic, the real craftsman. And he was a volunteer in the Philippines and we met in the Philippines. We met there and then he was in the Philippines for three years and after three years we married there and we came back together. Oh wow, okay. So can you tell me about first learning about tobeware with your husband? Yeah. Because he was a tobeware craftsman. He was a master. He was a master. He graduated as a ceramic artist, a potter in the ceramic school. And one of my sons is also a graduate of a ceramic school. I just learned by myself from my husband. And after he died, not when he was alive. So when he was alive, actually my husband died. I should have told you that. And he was alive. I was just an assistant like cleaning the workshop, just wiping things. And then I didn't paint even, not a single plate. But an old lady who was a businesswoman asked me to paint if I can. Okay. The proud Filipina says, oh I can, even if I didn't have experience. So I tried to paint something. Okay, I'll show you our workshop. Sure. This is where we work. This is where I make the art objects in the painting zone and then the art object zones and the tableware zone where we use potter's wheel. I see. And then this is also our table workshop where we make plates. And then this is the glazing part. And the shelves for the ready painted b-squares. And this is the oven, 0.7 cubic meter kiln. It's a gas kiln. It's firing now so it's very hot. So I think the first thing, the first thing is to make a mixture of the glaze. So the color, the color of the glaze. Yeah. So this is walking, if you walk us through the process. So this is one of the sky blue color pigment. It's actually a powder. When it's a powder you have to measure but through experience I don't measure. I just add it to this mixing bowls and then just mix it. And then actually we mix some other things inside. And this one is the we call kaiheki. Kaiheki. It's a cobalt glaze under color but it was originally made for my color. I asked the makers to make it for me because it's a different kind of blue which one you can see with the traditional tabeyaki. It is a very beautiful blue color. Right. So this is different from a dark blue gosu. Yes it's brighter and it is more purple. This is the washi we use for the forget-me-nots. It is very thin. Here. Can you touch it? Yeah sure. Oh it is very thin. And it has a nice texture too. Yeah but it is a very durable paper. So here it's like a textile. It doesn't break so well. Yeah it's almost like a fabric. Yes it's almost like a fabric. It's a Japanese traditional paper. Japanese washi like this. So if we start this way okay. This is a square. Now I start painting the middle one because I can control all the colors instead of the tensha. The stickers you don't control. So because of the washi the tones of the colors are different in every part of the flower. So it's very different and if you paint by brush it becomes flat but with washi it has different layers and tones of colors in just one stroke. What do you do with the leftover washi when you're finished? You just throw it away? Actually you can use it again and again but I have to straighten it up or iron it. I don't like to do that so I just use a new one every time. Yeah. Sorry but that is also one of the good things for the washi zome because it makes a beautiful tone a different tone. Yeah yeah the layering is really beautiful. Yeah here in Japan we don't use small amounts of glaze so put in big buckets. We have a cooperative which makes it for us so the ratio of the glaze itself is a secret so nobody will teach you what's inside it. I see. Now I'm going to dip it inside the glaze then inside it is just one level like this and then I have to put it back. What is the difficult part about doing this glazing? It's the count you say like this sorry it's just one two three and up four. You have to do it the same all the time for everything so that's the different and difficult part and the timing when to touch it because it's still wet so if you don't count then the rhythm becomes very difficult for you and okay like this yeah one and it just has to stand up this way and then you put it back and then in the bottom it's flat like this two three four oh wow you have to count every time so it's a very specific timing yeah and so it's very even and so it's quite smooth when it's baked exact temperature for the oxidation okay because we have to put air inside reduction firing rate we have to put the air inside so it will become white if not it will become yellowish yellow oh yeah so we call it sangka in Japanese sangka yaki means becomes yellow but it's kangen yaki so it means it will become very clear white okay this is for today's lunch for somen it's a Japanese noodle this tastes very very thin I hate to go out especially when I'm concentrating back so I just grow things in my garden and if it's ready then I eat it I only use what I make so it probably fits all all the kinds of dishes Japanese dish, Pacific dishes, Filipino dishes, Asian dishes what it's okay it fits well it looks good and it looks delicious there are many things here which I study for design because the things in nature has a very good balance so I get things from it aside but not from the books so I get everywhere from here you see the real thing yes yes and probably deform it this is a rock Japanese clay it's very smooth see you cannot find any stone pebble or sand in there may I feel it yeah sure sure yeah and it's very nice to your hands yeah I think this is quite different from the stoneware yeah so this is porcelain it's porcelain clay yeah it's white porcelain clay made typically only here in Shikoku or in Tobe yeah that's why there is a traditional tobe yaki in Tobe because we have the source in Tobe yeah the material is Tobe at this stage there will be many accidents so I just prepare myself for it so don't worry if I break something because it's still on the making stage and the color is almost the same so what part of the plant is this like you're thinking the chlorophyll the plant yeah the moving chlorophyll I like so earlier you showed me the sliver glaze right doing these dots so I wanted to ask also do you dip these pieces in glaze afterward also yeah yeah uh this one is already baked though um after this one right you see the different colors in between yeah you know you can see there's a green one here and then there's a light blue here and there's a dark one here there's that beautiful dark blue so this is different glazes in one piece so first layer is I just dip it on the pocket okay you dip it in and then when it dries I paint the the second layer of the glaze like the deep one and then when it dries again I try to drip another layer of glaze on top of it so it has probably six layers of different glazes layers yeah this one and the last one is the gold the the gold goes the oh beautiful yeah and different ways of glazing it so if you can see the drips here yeah you can see from the bottom yeah this is porting the glaze yeah this is so nice you should pick this one the ocean I am very keen on the ocean color so I really want to put it on my object so I just really want to put the the real color of the ocean I saw it's very nice this is not a consumer product this is somewhere else like at the museum or the gallery yeah this is yeah this is an art piece so now I have with right every day and this is the art yeah now I have two two separate separate worlds which I am giving to this town maybe my family first and then to the next generation and then what do you see for the future what's your vision for the future for the future if I'm alive I want to have an exhibition for this and then for this and it's separate separate rooms probably because this is also very important for me and this is also very important for the future so one has to see everything and then if I'm not alive I probably have a book all my my products in one exhibition in a museum or something and I really wanted to be an international artist so I really have to work harder than that that's my vision because I know I can do it don't forget to like and subscribe and we'll see you on our next trip