Ink on paper
Original Box
Showa Period
W34.5cm L115cm
Living National Treasure
This hanging scroll depicts a vase with plum blossoms. It is inscribed "昭和四十乙巳師走" in the upper left corner and signed Hajime in the lower left corner. Kato Hajime initially wanted to be a painter and studied design at the Department of Design. Kato Hajime was a potter who was recognized as a living national treasure in the field of colored porcelain, and together with Tomimoto Kenkichi, was considered one of the twin great masters of colored porcelain. He was a professor at Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music and the president of the Japan Crafts Association.
Hajime KATO 加藤土師萌
1900 - 1968
First studied design etc., under pottery art designer Hino Atsushi, afterwards working at Gifu Prefectural Ceramics Research Institute and starting to create pottery on the side in 1926. In 1927, he was selected for a prize for the first time in the eighth Exhibition of the Imperial Fine Arts Academy in the fourth category, the Industrial Art Category, which was newly established in the same year. Since then, he continued to exhibit his works, and took on the name “Hajime” from 1930.
Additionally, he received the Grand Prize at the Paris International Exposition in 1937, and in 1940, he built a kiln in Yokohama and focused on researching the glaze of China’s Ming Dynasty, creating a fusion of it with Seto glaze and receiving the Chunichi Cultural Award in 1952. In 1954, he established the ‘Touri Society’ in Touri, Izusan with Ishiguro Munemaro, Kaneshige Toyo, Arakawa Toyozo and Kato Tokuro. Furthermore, he left contributions in the research of porcelain as well, such as red-figure, white porcelain and celadon porcelain. In 1957, he was acknowledged as a preserver of the overglaze technique, and was then acknowledged as a Preserver of Important Intangible Cultural Property (Living National Treasure) in 1961.
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