Critical Ceramics does not usually publish letters to editor as articles. More often than not, they belong in our "Hear/Say" forums area. In fairness to Mr. Britt, we have decided to publish his response to Mr. Yasuda's Inquiry here. I hope to see lively discussion continue in "Hear/Say".

Forrest Snyder, Editor

Dear Takeshi Yasuda,

Thanks for your interest. I hope you enjoyed your tenure at Alfred. I don't know if I will be able to answer all your questions adequately, but I will try.

Your first question revolves around my first paragraph in The Unknown Craftsman is Dead:

"The unknown craftsman, Mingei and Bernard Leach are ubiquitous terms in ceramics today. Their influence pervades our education system, journals and folklore and yet very few people have any first hand knowledge of them. Instead they rely on word of mouth and romantic anecdotes which are then passed on in a slightly altered form each time to the next willing neophyte. This is the standard of the oral tradition which for thousands of years has been renowned for its creation of myths and legends."

I don't believe there is much to dispute about this paragraph. Indeed, I think your poll proves my point; perhaps the poll needs to be taken further to clarify the issue. I would suggest that you continue your straw poll to include seniors, juniors and graduates. Then poll your fellow professors and see if anyone knows Leach, The Unknown Craftsman or Mingei.

To backup this informal research, I suggest conducting a book search at your library or through Amazon.com and see how many books relate to these topics. Next, do a magazine/journal article search at the Ceramics Monthly website.

From this investigation, I believe that you will come to the inescapable conclusion that these topics are a very prominent force in ceramics in the United States and the United Kingdom. In fact, books and articles in both the US and the UK refer to Leach as the "Father of Studio Ceramics." It would be sadly ironic if the students at Alfred, the premiere school for studio ceramics in America, did not know the name of the person who many call the "Father of Studio Ceramics."

As I stated originally, not many people have first hand knowledge of Leach or Mingei. Rather many, if not most, of today's studio artists rely on anecdotes, folklore and myth for their positions. Again, I believe your survey actually proves this point. Potters think that they understand Mingei and the Unknown Craftsman and have imagined an "alternative life style movement" accordingly. Therefore, I believe my original paragraph is quite accurate and reinforced by your straw poll.

Now, addressing your second question is more involved. I hope I can make myself clear. First, I don't believe I mention Kawai or Tomimoto, but I did mention Yanagi. No matter, you are quite correct in believing that Hamada and Yanagi were not Mingei potters; they did not claim to be Mingei potters. Furthermore, I did not claim that they were Mingei potters. This is for a very good reason. There are no Mingei potters.

Yanagi invented the term in 1925 to save the ailing Japanese folk arts industry. As I point out:

It must be made by an anonymous craftsman or woman and therefore unsigned; it must be functional, simple, and have no excess ornamentation; it must be one of many similar pieces and must be inexpensive; it must be unsophisticated; it must reflect the region it was made in; and it must be made by hand.

Using Leach as an example, I showed that this original definition excludes everyone. It is an exercise in absurdity. The problematic terms being "unknown", "unsigned", "inexpensive", and "reflect the region it was made." For example, if you know someone who fits this description, then they are not anonymous and therefore cannot be a Mingei potter!

It is Yanagi's and Leach's modern adherents and apologists who mistakenly believe that there are Mingei potters. The term 'Mingei-sota' demonstrates how this imaginary term, Mingei, has been perpetuated.

I stated my view in the last paragraph of the original article:

"Finally, apologists of Leach claim that Yanagi proposed two kinds of Mingei. The 'jiriji-do' or the way of self -reliance and the 'tariki-do' or the way of reliance on others,'(19) We know Leach does not qualify as a 'tariki-do' so he must, as his proponents claim, be a jiriji-do. Yet claiming this distinction is disingenuous because there are no mingei 'tariki-do'. There weren't any then and there are none alive now. And yet that is the implied meaning when people use the term, mingei. While the definition of mingei - 'jiriji-do', is surprisingly, the individual artist, the genius, the 'man of capacity' who 'strikes out on his own driven by his inner search for personal expression.' This is the definition of the Individual Artist whom Leach fought so strongly against, and yet includes everyone working then, now and in fact Leach himself. Leach, Yanagi and Hamada were no Mingei, they were wealthy, well connected, art school educated, famous artist/philosophers."

In my mind, my point is quite clearly stated. Leach railed against the "Individual Artist" and you could easily find original source quotes in many of Leach's writings to support this view. Yet, this is exactly what he was, an Individual Artist. I believe that there is nothing wrong with the Individual Artist but Leach thought differently. He wrote volumes on the subject. Perhaps he was trying to reconcile the gap between his privileged upbringing and his idealized view of how to�the world should be.

Leach's modern apologists on the other hand, attempt to bridge this monstrous abyss, by dividing "Mingei" in to two categories "tariki-do" and "jiriji-do." As I stated previously, followed to its conclusion, tariki-do excludes everyone. Thus, there is only one definition of Mingei, jiriji-do, the Individual Artist. Ironically, I do not know anyone who uses the term Mingei in reference to the Individual Artist.

Please remember that these are my opinions on Leach, Yanagi and the Unknown Craftsman. The original intent of my article, The Unknown Craftsman is Dead, was to generate discussion that would cause people to read from the original sources and come to their own conclusions and not rely on folklore, hearsay, or the contemporary myths of Mingei.

I hope that this reply is clearly stated and encourages individual opinions and a lively discussion in your classes.

Sincerely,

John Britt

P.S. In case you are interested in a history of these articles, they came about in response to a series of "Comments" in Ceramics Monthly by Kevin Hluch. His articles influenced me to write "I, too, was a Neo-Leachian", which was a parody on the stance. Then, Gary Hatcher was doing an issue of "Studio Potter" entitled "Alternative Views of Leach" and asked me to write something about my take on Leach. So, after reading dozens of books and articles on the subject, I wrote several articles. Studio Potter rejected them; Ceramics Monthly published them.