Soetsu (Muneyoshi) Yanagi
Kodansha, New York, 1989 (revised ed.); originally published 1972 (in Japanese and English), English
Nonfiction, Art and Cultural History
ISBN: 780870119484

From Japan Woodworker. This book challenges the conventional ideas of art and beauty. What is the value of things made by an anonymous craftsman working in a set tradition and producing the same objects continuously for a life time? Why should even a roughly lacquered Japanese farmer's rice bowl be beautiful? The late Soetsu Yanagi was the first to fully explore the traditional Japanese appreciation for “objects born, not made.”

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Harry Pearce

This is a view into the mind of one of Japan’s great thinkers. A huge influence on Bernard Leach and the wonderful Shoji Hamada. A Japanese insight into the nature of beauty, full of wonderful observations on culture, design, and—ultimately—humanity.

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